20 Weeks: A Rose By Any Other Name

I’ve been thinking about what I’m going to name my kids someday since I was little.

I had many dolls and animals. Their names were: Janie, Sarah, Doodles, Bocker, Beaker, Churton.

Classics!

We have been bouncing around names for months now. There are a lot of beautiful names out there, but very few I can imagine actually choosing.

I tend to like names in 3 categories [So the name websites indicate!]:

Nature

Antique

H i p s t e r

Girls

A few of the girl names I like a lot [note Matt vetoed a few of these right away, but I’m including them for fun! We have a harder time liking the name girl names than boy names]

Ella

Ruth [Ruthie]

Lily

Violet

Iris

Flora

Pepper

Willow

Clementine

Hazel

Ivy

Frazier

Juliet

At least for now, I won’t get to use any of those!

Boys

Boy names we’ve tossed around have included [please note this list MAY or MAY NOT include the name we like the most at the moment, so I’m not really looking for feedback : )]

Asher

Dax

Max [Maxwell is Karen’s maiden name]

Potter

Davidson [nod to ye alma mater!]

Forest

Nash

Basil [pronounced like the herb, not like the Austin Powers character]

Baker

Jasper

Churton [street I grew up on]

Boy names I’m finding are so much harder!!

Family Input

My mom actually came up with the name Baker. Pretty appropriate for our family! In fact, she now calls the baby Baker Wheatsworth when she talks about him! I hope she’s not disappointed that Wheatsworth is not on the above list : )

Before we found out it was a boy, my Dad had suggested Dakota Savannah after our two most popular bakery items!

One thing’s for sure: we won’t be sharing the name with anyone until he is born!

Lastly And Lastly

And another non-negotiable: we’re hyphenating his last name to Younger-Monson. This isn’t up for debate, so while I know many of you probably have strong opinions about hyphenation, I’d appreciate it if you kept them out of the comments because we’re definitely hyphenating. We don’t think hyphenated names are the most beautiful either, but neither of us could imagine not having our last name as part of our son’s.

Since we got married, our families call us the “Younger-Monsons” and we both think that order of names sounds better than Monson-Younger. We debated for a split second to do something super creative and become the Youngsons, but since both Matt and I are very attached to our last names (why neither of us changed them to the other’s upon marriage) we didn’t think that choice really made sense, as it would mean a new identity for not only the baby but for us as well.

I WOULD like to hear your favorite boy + girl names! We haven’t really made a decision yet and I love hearing all the cool names out there.

same!! While some of the names you chose are cool, kids have enough to deal with these days without having some really offbeat name. Both you and Matt have classic names and probably didn’t have to deal with people making fun of your name. Ruthie and Max are not very popular (at least not that I know of) but are absolutely adorable!! Not too overdone at all, but still not too out there. Love them!

Yes – when you are naming your child, you are acting on their behalf in a very important matter. It’s not what the parents want, it’s what will be smart and good for your child. As this wonderful baby names book puts it “Knowing what you know about the world now, would YOU want to go through life with that name?” (from The Baby Name Wizard)

Very interesting about the last name thing! I like seeing different situations, such as you both loving your last names. I took my husband’s…but for me, that’s what I wanted. I think it’s awesome to be different!

So I wanted to say, that my niece’s name is Ella, AND my sis-in-law just had her third child (second daughter) on Friday and named her Ayla. I love how the 2 girls names go together!!

I think you have some beautiful options…and love that the parents are getting involved!! It’s funny that you put Violet on there because I thought my SIL was going to name the second girl that!! Good luck choosing

Good for you for sharing the names that you like. My husband and I are keeping ours a secret for now, partly because of the whole feedback issue! I think I’m going to keep my favorites out of the blog world for now…but I will say that our list and your list have almost no repeats. Amazing how many names there are out there!

My son is 3 month old and we named him Elias. We call him Elias or Bear (his middle name) and grandparents call him Eli. LOVE. IT. We liked the name because of the way is sounded but once we found the meaning “the Lord is my God” we were completely sold!

Well I know you are not having a girl, but I am partial to the name Ella. Our first daughter is named Ella Grace and I love that name. However, the name is really popular now a days and it would not be a unique name at school.

We named our 4th child Andrew Parker and I love that name! It’s traditional yet different.

And about the popularity….it IS a little too popular right now but it also has to do with where you live. When we lived in California, we knew other little girls with the name Ella but in Missouri we don’t.

It is SO hard to pick a name! When deciding a name we were torn. I wanted something classis and my boyfriend wanted something a little different. We ended up with a baby boy named Auden River Thompson. Everyone who hears his name always comments how much they love it and that they have never heard it before. It is actually an old English name meaning “old friend”. It is pronounced like the poet W.H. Auden. We are so glad we came up with something we think is a beautiful name but also unique. Good luck with the naming process! So exciting 🙂

You’re always setting yourself up for criticisim when discussing the name before the baby’s born. My BIL and SIL aren’t telling anyone until their little girl is born. But, then again, it might be a good idea to see people’s reaction to the name before you put it down on the birth certificate. Something may sound good in your head but others may hear it a different way. I’ve got a pretty weird middle name becuase my dad got a little creative. You won’t find it on any of the baby name sites.

Oh, I know. I read that part. I just meant a general “you” in the first sentence. Whenever names are discussed, people feel the need to jump on and give their opinion. That’s why it’s good to wait like you’re doing.

Even though we don’t know the sex of our baby yet (we find out the 25th!!), we already have names picked. I’ve had the girl’s name picked even before we got pregnant. My husband knows I will not budge on this name – but we really likes it anyways so he won’t complain. If it’s a girl, she will be named Eva Marie. Eva was my grandmother’s name – she raised me. And Marie is my middle name. If it’s a boy, we are naming him after my husband. Michael Joseph. 🙂

Good luck on the names! I know it’s a BIG decision but you and Matt will pick the perfect name for your little one.

I actually found boys names to be so much easier to decide on! We had a big list and quickly narrowed it down. As for girls names that list was much harder to make and I think we have finally made a decision or at least 98% sure we have. I had Basil and Dax on our list of boys names but my husband vetoed both. Also love Asher but we have a friend who has a little boy named Asher so that one got taken off the list too. We are also hyphenating our babies last name even if that means it will be a million letters (Ingalls-Fairweather) since my husband and I decided to keep our own last names when we got married.

I’ve found girls names so difficult to decide on too. My husband and I were actually recently discussing that and we think it has to do with wanting the “perfect” name for the world to take your girl seriously. Someday she’ll [hopefully] be a successful woman, and so the name has to fit both being a cute little girl and womanhood. For some reason it seems like men have an easier pass on this. Or maybe it’s just us being overly paranoid.

A big kudos to you for sticking with hyphenation if that’s what you want! When my husband and I got married, neither of us were very attached to our last names, but neither of us wanted to take the other’s name, for various reasons. We ended up creating an entirely new name, and we love it. Works for us!

I love all the names on your lists! I especially love Baker, because that is my maiden name. I had never thought to use it as a boy’s name. My father passed away recently, and I can’t think of a better tribute. So, if we have a boy next time that will definitely be on my list.
My daughter’s name is Raina Catherine. My husband actually picked out Raina and it just stuck. She is definitely a Raina! The name Catherine is after my grandmother, who was a very special person to me.
I agree totally with keeping the name a secret. We didn’t, and we got some comments that made us feel less than excited about our name choice. When we go down that road again we will be more hush hush. 🙂

Some really great names! Some are totally unique without being too weird, KWIM. My favs are Asher, Max and Davidson (or Davis would be cute).
I am a true believer in using family names or something that “means” something to you both, not just picked randomly from a baby book. Our son is Owen Walter – Owen is a Welsh version of John (my Dad’s name) and Walter was my husband’s grandfather. Our daughter is RIley Cathryn – Riley is my maiden name and Cathryn is by MIL’s first name (she goes by her middle).

Have you come across the Swistle: Baby Names blog yet? I’ve always loved looking at names and the combinations of first, middle, last that people come up with so this blog is purely read for entertainment. I’m no where near ready to have kids but I love to look at the possibilities!

My husband and I just found out we’re having a little boy and our top three names are Max, Jack, and Henry. Our last name is pretty feminine and can also be considered a first name (it’s on your girl name list, actually!), so we wanted to go with something that is clearly a first name (versus something like Thomas which could be mistaken for a last name) and something that sounds masculine. Right now we’re “practicing” calling the baby by a name to see what feels most natural. 🙂

By the way, we’re due just days apart (I’m 21 weeks today!) so it’s been extra fun to follow your journey!

Our dog’s name is Asher 🙂 and I think it would make a great human name! And our son’s name is Roan Anderson. We just liked Roan and my dad’s name is Anderson. For our hopefully second child I like Lena and Liam. Enjoy the process!

I agree that you can prosper with a name that is a popular dog name. I personally just would prefer not to hear when I tell someone (stranger, friend, doctor, etc) my child’s name, “Oh that’s my dog’s name!” And this is from someone who loves dogs.

But, to each his own. I personally have loved spending over an hour reading everyone’s opinions and name suggestions! Such great ideas out there!

I am more for slightly traditional names, my daughters are Rebecca Dee, Katelyn Diane, and Natalie Grace. So I am not a fan of most of your names, I cringe at Willow, Pepper, Frazier, Potter, Basil, Baker and Churton. Ultimately once I meet someone and get to know them, their name usually fits their personality and their non-traditional name grows on me. I am sure it will be the same with your baby boy!
Mharche? Nontraditional spellings make me cringe too. I have an unusual last name and it is no fun spelling it constantly, I can’t imagine having to spell my first name.

phew. I was going to comment that I really *hoped* Mharche was a joke. I don’t mind some non-traditional spellings – like trading a y for an i or vice versa – if the name is still easy to pronounce. but totally butchering the name to something that’s going to get mispronounced makes me wonder what on earth the parents were thinking. I am a polite person, so I keep those thoughts to myself and wouldn’t say anything to the parents, but I know I must not be the only one wondering. (maybe the fact that I am a teacher and see a LOT of “interesting” names makes me a little more sensitive to the subject. I’ll give you that.)

I agree with one of the commenters above. Keeping secret is great, but you might want to run it by one or two close (smart) friends just in case there is something you haven’t thought of. Not so much “you’ll get made fun of at recess,” but more so a negative connotation that could affect them in future opportunities (I read this once on a website where someone wanted to named their daughter Nixon, but can’t find it now). Good luck!

boy names are so hard for me too! i had 2 girl names and 1 boy name picked before i ever even got pregnant but now that i have a boy, i kind of only want boys. but i have no other boy names i really like or that my husband and i agree on. of course, my favorite boy name is alexandre since it’s my son’s name. it’s pronounced like the traditional “alexander” but we chose the name from the arthurian legend (my husband’s name is arthur) so we decided to go with that spelling.

I love names! I think it’s so fun to discuss and hear other people’s favorites (and I don’t like that people get judge-y). I like the different categories too. I’m no where near having kids myself, but I’ve definitely already have a couple names picked out. For a girl I love Elaina, Abigail and Ruby, and for boys I love Benjamin, Harrison, and Cameron. I really like adding a family connection to the names too, whether it be first or middle!

I know you said no input allowed on hyphenation, but I love that option. 🙂 I think that’s the perfect compromise and you two are both very lucky to both feel confident enough to agree on it. It shows you are both both strong and open minded. 🙂

Also, I LOVE the name Asher! That’s actually one of the names Derek and I have thrown back and forth as a potential boy name (in the far, far future). I also love the name Nolan (shorten to Nole as an ode to our alma mater), but I let that name slip to a friend one time and it’s now on the top of her baby name list for the same reason. I guess it’s true what they say – don’t share your baby names or else other friends might grab the good ones up.

Really love all the name choices, both boy and girl. If we didn’t have our girl name picked out (I’m 21 weeks!), I’d be adding a few of your name choices to our short list. And also super envious of how nicely your last names flow together. They sound fantastic together! My husband and I have different last names but the thought of hyphenating our last names (mine is a super Polish last name filled with consonants that shouldn’t be next to each other in a last name and his is a 9 letter Venezuelan last name) is unfortunately not going to happen. It breaks my heart. I’m thinking about maybe giving the baby his last name and giving her my last name as a middle name, but even still, it’s quite the unfortunate mouthful.

We were in a similiar situation- with my last name 10 letter (and hard to pronounce) and my husbands 9 letters. So we went with my last name as our daughters middle name, and she has my husbands last name. It’s not perfect, but its working fo us… But I do wish hyphenating wouldn’ t have saddles our daughter with a 19 letter last name, as that would have been our first choice.

kz- Glad to hear someone else did this. Agreed, it isn’t perfect, but at least it’s working for you guys. I think we’ll likely go ahead with it. I hadn’t heard of anyone else doing this so thanks for sharing!

Now sure what the tradition in the Venezuelan culture is, but my dad’s family has a tradition that the mother’s maiden name ALWAYS is the middle name of the child. That might be something to consider, because it can be a nod to his culture/family and also might work well as a compromise.
I also kept my maiden name, so now I have 5 names in total 😉 It’s not so bad!

I actually like the British way of pronouncing Basil.. but that’s probably because I associate it with the character Basil Fawlty from Fawlty Towers, who is a bumbling idiot but is played by John Cleese, who I love. I haven’t seen Austin Powers but I’m assuming that association is worse!

But anyway, have fun with the names! I usually go for more traditional, but one of my English professor’s kid’s names is Dashiell, pronounced dah-shell, after the author Dashiell Hammet, which I actually really like. But I think the most important is picking a name that is significant to you, like him choosing one of his favorite authors.

I love the name Asher, and I’ve been trying to convince my husband to love it too because we are pregnant. He’s convinced a kid would be teased and called Ash. Hoping I can change his mind. If not Asher, I wanted to name our first kid, regardless of sex Campbell since it’s his grandmother’s maiden name and his middle name but he isn’t sold on this one either. (So difficult!)

Thankfully we have a girl name/middle name already picked out and seeing how it’s a family name/family tradition, he can’t argue with me on that one 😉 If we have a girl she will be named Anna Blake.

I think this may be an indication of the difference between generations. I associate the name Ash with a rather nasty character in the original Alien movie! But I think that movie was made before you were born! 🙂

Caleb: because we love that it means “bold and faithful” and that is what we want our son to be. (Note: we named him Caleb before there was a surge of Calebs born. LOL!”)

Casmir: He is named after his Great-Grandpa from Poland. My Father-in-Law immigrated from Poland in his 20’s and married an American girl. Most of that side of the family still lives in Poland and we wanted to carry that legacy forward especially since, as of right now, Caleb is the only grandchild who will carry the last name. 🙂

I love hearing that there are family meanings behind names. Caleb Casmir not only sounds great, but it is special to your family.

we don’t have anything too unique in our family for names (lots of English and Irish up in here), but we are going to honor family members with the middle names of our children. if we have a boy he will have two middle names – Roman and William – the names of our two grandfathers who passed away in 2011. if we have a girl, her middle name will be a combo of our mothers’ names. Lori + Lisa = Lorisa. 🙂

I’d like to do a combo of our mothers’ names for a middle name too – but I have not found the right first name to go with it. Linda + Shirley = Linley. Isn’t that cool? And, a boy middle name will be either my father’s first name or my father’s middle name because my husband’s dad already gets to carry on the last name! SO, either Gilbert or Joseph for that…I’m thinking Jacob Gilbert would be a good boy name (always loved the name Jacob and my husband likes traditional)…but…no girls first name yet…good thing we are nowhere near having a baby yet! 🙂

Good luck Kath – thanks for sharing this much! I figured names were off the table for discussion since you were keeping them a secret….but it’s been fun to read the comments!

One of my step-brother’s names is Casmir, we call him Caz. I’ve never seen it anywhere else! My step-dad is 100% Polish and still has family over there too, so I’m certain it’s more common in that country.

For us the boy’s name were more difficult to find than the girl’s name. We had difficulties to be ok. I like Gustave and Emile but he hate these names 🙁 Finally our son’s name is Alexandre.
About the last name, we’re not married but, even if, I want to keep my name. At first I also wanted to append our names but my partner’s name is too long. The little boy has his father’s last name… And that’s ok because the association of his name and his last name shows his cultural mix (France and Maghreb).

I wish I could have gotten a bit more creative with naming my three boys. I like old english names, but my ex wasn’t for it. Ah well… All of them have first names that were my chosing, so I can’t be too upset over it! 😉 I’m all for creative and unique names (really loving most of yours!), but I could NOT believe my ears what an old friend named her son – Arsen Midnite!! Oy vey. Could they not at least spell it correctly?!?

Picking out names is so much fun! We didn’t have a list for any of our three kids. With our son, my husband just said, “What do think about Christian?” And I knew that was his name right away. Then when we had our twin girls, I’d always loved the name Grace, so I ran it by the hubs and he agreed it was a beautiful name. A couple weeks after that, out of the blue, he asks, “What about Hannah?” That was it. Hannah and Grace. I loved it. I even knew from the get go which baby was Grace and which was Hannah. After deciding the girls’ names, we searched out the meanings of the names and turns out Hannah is Grace is Hebrew. 🙂 We thought that was pretty cool.

Ella was the girl name on the top of our name list a few years ago too! I love that name but one of our friends took it before we had kids and so far we’re striking out on girls anyway (boy #2 on the way!). Boys are so amazing and I know you’ll LOVE being a mama to one.

I could never settle on a boy name but my husband is super good at it and we’ve got two really great ones for our sons so I didn’t have to struggle through the process!

If I had kept my maiden name I would certainly hyphenate as well, it’s the only way to get both in! People definitely are opinionated on the matter and I myself wondered if I wanted to let my maiden name go upon marriage or maybe even make it my middle name. After some consideration I decided my first and middle name were chosen by my parents and my last name would represent my new commitment. Everyone has to go through those decisions!

We found our baby girl’s name walking a historical cemetery about a week before I delivered her (Susan B. Anthony and Frederick Douglas are buried there). The name we found was Susan B’s best friend and a well-known suffragette in our area of Rochester, NY. It was totally last minute and never made the drafts – we also never shared it with anyone until she was born which was the best decision since family and friend can be pretty critical.

Now that we’re expecting baby #2 (we didn’t find out the gender either time), we’re heading back to the cemetery for some inspiration!

I love your names and honestly, picking a name seems like the most interesting part of having a baby. (I mean, until you have the actual baby.) I will say, though, that I have a niece named Pepper and it makes me a little sad! It seems like a great name for a black lab but a inadequate name for a little girl. And it fails the SCJ test! (Supreme Court Justice Pepper Lastname? Never!)

I kind of picture Supreme Court Justice Pepper as distinguished and a bit feisty, which reminds me of the baby name book where they tell you what people’s impressions of different names are. I loved that book.

In the end, some names just sound a little odd/weird until a child is attached to them. Any/all of them would work just fine, as long as you like them.

My husband is the same way! I tease him that a little girl spends her whole life concocting the perfect baby names only to have them vetoed in a matter of 5 seconds…

We actually don’t have any children yet, but a good friend of mine gave me the tip to pull out your favorite name towards the end of the pregnancy when you’re both sick of over analyzing names and everything starts to sound good. Haha!

Wow Kath I am slightly shocked to see Pepper on your list! My husband I have had that name in our back pocket for about 10 years for our future daughter, when the time comes. And I RARELY see or hear it out there – which is a big part of the appeal! Perhaps there is a Pepper Yonger-Monson in your future, to go along with our Pepper Everett 🙂

All of those names sound great, and i’m sure whatever you choose will be perfect for baby boy Younger-Monson. For a hyphenated name, that flows pretty well! I’ve always loved Lilly and my other favorite girl name is Hadley. I really like Harper too, but my best friend has already called that name for her (future) baby so it’s out of the question for us 🙂 Boys names have always seemed harder to me… I like Hayden and Jackson (we already have two of these in the family) and Fisher, which has been in our family for several generations. Anyway, I can’t wait to hear what you choose!

I love “C” names for boys, but our last name starts with C and there is something about the CC alliterative names for boys I don’t like. Otherwise my first might have been a Cole, Colin, Charlie, or Chandler. My other favorites have too many associations and were vetoes as well- Noah, Ryan, and Matthew. I also love Jake, but it wouldn’t sound good with our last name. You’ll know when you come up with the right name. We had a girl name picked out (and have for years!) so hopefully we’ll get to use it someday. My favorites include Taylor, Eleanor, Elise, and Olivia.

I completely understand how difficult it is to decide what to do about last names. The constant input from people who disagree with your choice is annoying. I actually can’t believe some of the comments my close friends have made about our name choice. I am very attached to my name. I am french, and my name is french, while my husbands is not. Changing my name felt like changing my heritage. Ultimately, I decided that I wanted to have the same name as my kids, that was most important for me. So, I kept my last name as a middle name and took my husbands name, and he also took my name as a middle name. It was a very difficult decision though. Good for you for being creative and finding something that works for both of you.

I love how a lot of your names have special meanings. Excited to hear what you pick!

I think hyphenating your last names is a great solution to both of you loving your last names. I got married almost a year ago and couldn’t imagine giving up my last name, so I made it my middle name 🙂 Also, a co-worker of mine and their spouce both hyphenated their names to include both of their last names. It was odd at first seeing a man with a hypenated last name, but I think it’s pretty cool that he did not just expect her to give up a part of herself because they are married. I know you were not looking for opinions, this is more of a comment than an opinion 🙂

Asher and Forest were on our short list but we ended up with Hunter because my husband’s middle name (and his great grand dad’s) is Hunt. My son ended up being born on May 4th (Star Wars Day-may the 4th be with you) so for a brief moment he was almost named Jedi 😉 Our list also included Lennon, Jarvis, Logan, Reilly, and Echo.
It’s funny but my son is clearly a Hunter and not a Jarvis 🙂 So whatever you choose will be perfect and exactly who he is through and through.

We found that girl names were far easier for us to come up with, which is good, since we have two of those creatures now. In fact, we never settled on boy names for either, although we had a short list.

We are traditionalists, so we stuck with family names: Grace Elizabeth and Eleanor Meredith. First names relate directly to someone in the grandma lines and middle names are for our sisters (Pete’s sister is Amy Elizabeth and mine is Meredith).

As a Jennifer, I’m hyper aware of trendy names, so we avoided any names that were in the top 25 of popularity for at least five years prior to our daughters’ births, although it appears that we were on the cusp of new trends anyway and 1998 was the start of a renewal for Grace and 2000 was a big year for Ellies and Ellas. *sigh*

As for your own baby’s name, it’s your business and no one else’s. Anyone who comments negatively or tries to change your mind is rude and totally out of line.

I’m one of about 7 Julies from my elementary/high school days…and even now at 33, I’m one of 3 Julies in my jazzercise class. I also would tend to stay away from overly popular names…and I like a name with a nickname. There are a couple available nicknames for Julie but someone was always already Jules.

I completely understand your decision to keep the name to yourselves, as feedback can sometimes be very judgemental. Whatever name you and Matt settle on will be perfect for your son. I love your choices, especially Nash and Max (both sound great with Younger-Monson!)

With both my children we had names prepared and then when we saw them we changed our minds. My daughter was actually a bit of a struggle because she came out with jet black hair and, suffice it to say, that was a surprise…of course it all fell out and came in very blonde, but it definitely threw us off in the naming.

We had a really hard time with boy names! But we ended up having a little girl and actually agreed on the name right away thankfully! Her name is Lillian, but we usually call her Lilly or Lil..Lillian if she is being naughty 🙂 I loved the name Jude for a boy and still do, but my husband was totally against that one. Oh and I also like Eben for a boy! If we were to have another girl, I like the names Kinley and Hadley. So fun to pick the name!

I’ve been following (ok, creeping) your sites for the past few weeks- partially because I too am pregnant and due in late August! Names are a big deal for my hubby and I as well- having struggled with infertility for almost 5 years we’ve had quite a while to come up a list of names! Girl names have definitely need easier to come by for us- we have 4! Only catch? We’re expecting a boy- and naming him Noah Tarver, which means “peaceful leader.” Congrats to you all and happy naming!

I love old fashioned and non traditional names. My husband and I just had a baby girl a month ago and couldn’t agree on her name until the day she was born (we also didn’t know the baby’s gender until she was born). We were torn between Charlotte and Ruby but ultimately chose Ruby because it was far less common than Charlotte. We let our 6 year old and 4 year old choose her middle name to which they agreed upon Grace (I think my son has a slight crush on a little girl in his class named Grace 🙂 ) Our boys are named Parker James and Theo Sam. My husband chose Parker and I chose Theo while both middle names are family names.

I love that you’re keeping a part of both sides of the family within your baby’s name! My last name is hyphenated and I truly regret not doing the same for our children. I also think it’s great that you’ve decided to keep the name a secret. I was very hurt (and annoyed) when several family members made negative comments about our second son’s name and feel that they would have probably (hopefully) just kept it to themselves if we wouldn’t have divulged the name before the birth.

Good luck and thanks for sharing your baby journey! It’s so much fun to read about others’ experiences!

Kudos to you for sharing potential names. I would be terrified of the comments I would get! People give awful responses to baby names in person, so I can only imagine what they would say when they can hide behind a computer screen!

I have similar choices in girls names, love the flower/nature names. I just think they are so pretty! Of course my husband vetoed a lot of them right away too but we’re having a boy anyways so I guess it’s ok lol
Boys names have always been really hard for me! So I fell in love with one name and couldn’t imagine naming my little boy anything else and luckily my husband loves it and it sounds good with our last name so it’s set.
I love the idea of keeping the name a surprise (we are as well) since we shared the gender early. It’s nice to have a little surprise at the end for everyone!! Also because we are already in love with the name and it’s chosen (I have nursery art already ordered with his name on it lol) I do NOT want to be swayed on the name or hear negative feedback from people because I don’t want it to stop me from loving the name or trying to have to justify to people why we love it. It’s also not a weird or crazy name either but people have so many different opinions you will always run into someone that doesn’t the name. He will be named that and people will get used to it if they don’t like it. It’s our baby not theirs!! 🙂 Good luck, hope you and Matt can find one you both love.
My parents named me Reghan, and in 1984 that was a strange name (it’s getting a little more popular now but still nowhere near common) but I always loved my name despite having to spell it ALL the time. I was always the only one with my name and I got SO many compliments from people on it so having a different name isn’t always bad either 🙂

I’m pretty traditional when it comes to names (my son has a biblical name). I don’t think naming a child is where you (universal) should show just how clever you can. I tried to picture my son’s name on the top of a resume. Plenty studies have shown people judge you by your name. I also didn’t want to mess with “alternate spellings” otherwise they’ll have to be spelling their name out their whole life!

Just some tips 🙂 The baby names board on the bump is great if you want to submit a name anonymously and get general feedback on it. Good luck! Boys names are infinitely harder than girls.

Yes! Have you read the section of Freakanomics that talks about names? It’s really interesting. They use the example of “Jasmine” (I think…I read it a long time ago) and show how the more “uniquely” it’s spelled, the lower the average income of people with that name. They also talk about sending resumes into companies…same resume, different name on top. The “white” name always got more interviews than the more unique or “ethnic” name. Really interesting (and often unfortunate).

As someone with a non traditional name, when I have a kid it’s going to be simple; think Bob or Linda. My name has been mispronounced and mangled my entire life and frankly, it’s somewhat of a burden. While I am now 26 and don’t bother correcting anyone anymore (what’s the point?) I am more mellow about my name. But seriously, it was tough growing up with a name people can’t say right. The first two weeks of school were always the worst until the teachers learned the correct pronunciation. And at the doctor’s office? Torture.

Absolutely no criticism is intended, just giving a viewpoint of someone with a non traditional name. While my parents loved it enough to give it to me, I am less in love with it. I’m the one carrying it my entire life, not my parents. 🙂

Just a perspective: Katherine Anne Younger is a pretty simple name and I almost always still have to spell it! Katherine is guess more because there’s Katharine, Kathryn, Catherine, etc., Anne “with an e!” if I have to share that, but I also have to spell Younger a lot – or rather I just do because the next question is always “Younger? Like…younger” so I just say “my last name is Younger, y-o-u-n…etc.”

I get the spelling as well, just like an Ashley. That can be spelled a bunch of different ways.

One day when I get pregnant I think I’ll also take into consideration when naming the baby how well the name will age. You know what I mean? Something like Mallory is okay for a teenager but would it suit an 80-year old? Eleanor is fun but would it suit an 8 year old? I hope I give my kids names that grow with them and suit them their whole lives.

Regardless, what you and Matt decide will be fine. Gee, I’ve been stressing about what I’ll name my kids for ten years and I’m not even married yet! haha. Such a big decision.

I know an Eleanor, and I think it suits her just fine! I think that no matter what someone’s name is, it is going to fit them no matter what. It’s like they “grow into it” or something.. just fits perfectly with their personality!

I’m a middle name Anne with an E, (and I’ve got the non-traditional Elisabeth with an S, as well) 🙂 Actually, I think my parents picked my name extremely well – I think Elisabeth Anne goes really well together. I like a few of your choices, especially Max and Dax. My usual choices are very traditional, older names – for a girl I prefer Sophia (my great-great grandma’s name) and for boys I like: Isaac, Christian, Jacob (great-great grandpa’s name), Nicholas and Paul 🙂

To all the commenters who are so stuck on not picking unusual names because of other people spelling it…So what if people mispronounce and mispell? People ask the spelling for my last name, White (I mean come on), all the time and everytime I have the same response, “Like the color”. But the point is that it doesnt matter what your name is, people always ask to be curtious to you, and to make sure they haven’t misheard, and to make sure that they are respectful of the differences of spelling.

I have had the opposite problem all my life. My name is Jennifer White, and there are 5 others of me at my university ALONE. Talk about not feeling special. I can’t wait to take on my boyrfiends last name Bravo someday, just so that I can jazz it up a bit.

My best friends, Kate and Avery Aoueille (pronounce, AL-YAY) are always asked the origin of their name and people are always fascinated by it. That name is hard to spell but so what, if you’re used to it, it doesn’t really matter anyway.

As for unusual names, and not specifically spelling,
I think it’s a great conversation starter and people are always complentrary of unusual names. For example, when my boyfriend hands over his credit card and people read that it says “Ethan Bravo” people always compliment him and his parents for such a strong and interesting name! Same with my aforementioned friends Kate and Avery Aoueille. The only comments I’ve ever received on my name is, “oh thats bland”.. I know.

And PS side note, as I am typing this the guy next to me told the girl next to me that his neice was born today and that he name is bryell (spelling? pronounced brie-el) and they have a 30 second convo on how pretty and unusual the name was!!! Ha! Proof!

We actually named our daughter Elise, after a dear great-aunt who was like a grandmother to me. Unfortunately her first name was Edna, and we couldn’t find a way to use that, so we went with a form of her middle name, Elisabeth. The only place I’ve heard it mispronounced was when a nurse at the doctor’s office called her “Elsie” once.

I’m all about incorporating family names. Some of my other favorite girl’s names are Audrey, Felicity, Harper, Piper and Willow. For boys I like Blake, Luke, Forrest and Jasper.

My name got butchered a lot too (fairly similar to yours), but the uniqueness of it and the compliments I’ve received through the years have more than made up for it. I’m happy my parents gave me a unique name, mispronounced and all 🙂

I’ve heard everything from “Bran” to “Brine” to “Brian” .. by a teacher who knew I was a girl. People always ask me about it and how to spell it and it’s really not a big deal! It’s a great conversation starter. However, it does get frustrating repeating my one-syllable name to people multiple times.

Amen to what everyone said about the courage it takes to share baby names in this day & age. Looks like everyone’s (mostly) playing nice, which is good! 🙂

Here are our potential baby names:
*Madelyn Ann (My grandmother was Marilyn, my middle name is Lyn after her, hence the “Y” in there, which I KNOW people hate, but it means something so…bleh. Ann is my MIL’s first name, and my mom’s middle name.)
*Ruby Christine (I just like Ruby, and Christine is my mom’s name)
*Corbett Douglas (Corbett is my MIL’s maiden name, Douglas is the name of a favorite uncle of mine who passed away)
*Fisher Robert (Fisher is my mom’s maiden name, Robert is my dad’s name)

When my husband and I met, we had both already–separately–had the plan to name any sons after our mothers’ maiden names! Too funny. So–if we have a boy first, we go with Corbett (his pick), if we have a girl first, we go with Madelyn (my pick), and then we figure it out from there.

I actually really like Baker. It seems very fitting for the two of you.

We find out next week if we’re having a girl or a boy. My fiance put up some fights about the girl name, even though we decided years ago what it would be. All of a sudden he wasn’t sure, but after two months of debate, we are back with the original. Go figure!

We’re actually using family names for both boy and girl. For a boy, Jack Richard after both of our grandfathers. For a girl, Delaney Gray. Gray is my fiance’s stepfather’s last name. He helped raise him from the time he was a year old, but never adopted because his biological father was still in the picture. We are so happy we can honor him in this way!

I’ve always been torn on the whole whether to divulge ahead of time, or not to. We’ve always said no, just to be ornery and avoid scrutiny, but, on the other hand, what if you cousin/friend/neighbor/whoever takes the name you were planning on and you look like a baby-name thief? I truly never realized how political the whole name thing can be (if you let it). We’ll decide when the time comes and it becomes relevent.

Two names my husband has vetoed: Darwin and Claire (so they will therefore be my next dog names).

Love all your names! I think I sway toward the antique/hipster varieties. I used to love the name Ava, but now it’s far too popular. I really like Vivian for a girl, with the middle name Lorraine to honor my grandmother and also as a reference to my first name. For a boy, both the hubs and I like Henry, but it’s awhile down the road. I, too, plan to keep the name a secret when the time comes. I might share it with my best friend to get her input, but absolutely no family input. 🙂

I teach elementary school so a lot of different names come through my classroom 🙂 Some of my favorite boy names that are a little different are Gailen, Pierson, Adrian, Jai, Bala, Jackson, Theo, Caleb, and Chase. Some of the girl names that stand out are Parisa, Sanjana, Krina, Darien, Maya, Meera, Carleigh, Ariane, Nylah, Sierra, Ava, and Adya. My own sons are Christian and Gregory and their middle names are John and Michael. I think whatever name you decide on you will love once your child has it. My one suggestion would be to watch out for weird spellings of common names because they will get tired of spelling their name and everyone spelling it wrong all the time.

I really like unisex names. My oldest son is Taylor, my daughter is Camryn, and my youngest son is Mason. Here are the only problems with their names: if I call the doctor’s office, for example, they say, “What is HER birth date?” in reference to my son Taylor. No one can spell Camryn and people automatically assume it is a boy name. And the problem with Mason’s name? That Kardashian named her son Mason so now there might be a lot more kids with that name.

But I still love my kids’ names! It is important, as another reader commented, to see how it sounds when you are saying their full name in a frustrated tone, because you WILL say it a lot!! 😉

We named our daughter Ryan. We could not agree on a “girly” name so we picked out names that could work for both. Her middle name is Grace so she does have a more feminine middle name. I also like Blake, Carter, Parker and Devon for a girl (I know you are having a boy). Our boys are Conner and Jacob, but they are so common now! I like Corbin for a boy too.

I am a girl named “Ryan”! Though, my parents thought they were clever by adding an “E” to make it feminine (French rule though we are Irish!). I’ve always loved the name and will probably do something unisex for my own children – Jaime, Shawn, Kelly, Jordan, etc.
My only grudge is the spelling makes most people pronounce it RY-ANN or RY-ANNIE or RENEE and I do get some looks of surprise when people who have seen my name (like work emails, first day of school) a lot and then finally meet me in person and never realized I was female but I like taking people by surprise 😉 Though, I could lose all of the emails written to MR. Lastname!!

PS. I LOVE Pepper!!! actually, all of the Nature/herb names! And Dax and Asher!

Great discussion on the names. We never told anyone the children’s names until they were born – didn’t need the opinions or feedback. When deciding on names, we stayed away from family names to avoid showing favoritism, had a little of my Irish heritage, and wanted names that passed the initial test (where the first, middle, and last name initials didn’t spell or could mean something inappropriate– kids can be cruel in school). So in the end we went with: Carson Bailey, Isaac Parker, and Caitlin Abigail. You wouldn’t believe how many times I had to correct people on the spelling of all their first names.

We told people our name choices ahead of time for both kids. However, I am so traditional that even if the names we chose aren’t someone’s favorite, they probably aren’t on anyone’s hate-it list either. My own name is too trendy for me!

We are also nickname people, and our last name is one syllable so we kind of needed both the full name and the nickname to be two or more syllables for balance. And when we chose my daughter’s name, it had to be something that coordinated with my son’s…not crazy about using two totally different kinds of names with siblings, even if I like both names. Example: John and Rainbow. It either has to be John and Mary or Rainbow and Sunshine (not that I would ever use the latter, but you get the idea).

I’m due in 5 weeks and I think we are settled on Maverick for a boy and Olivet Hope for a girl. Hubby hasn’t agreed to Olivet but this is our sixth kid and I have been fighting for that name for three kids now- I will get it:-) We don’t tell either as people are less likely to give their opinion once its a done deal and can’t be changed.

Very creative! I agree with you- names aren’t always easy to pick out.
Way back when, when I got bored, I would think of baby names that I liked.
I can come up with names I like, but I am terrible at pairing up first and middle names. /:

I am partial to my name (pronounced stay-shuh). I hated it growing up because no one could say it right. I still occasionally use Stacey when picking up panera (for example). I love my name now, I don’t know anyone else who has it. If I marry my boyfriend then I might have to give up my dream names because he is Indian and wants his kids to have Indian names, which I get. I love the names Arianna, Vincent, Cameron,and Natalia.

Of the names you listed I really like Max, especially given the family significance. Boy names I really like are Rhett, Isaac and Grey. It’s funny that Asher is so in vogue right now given how old school biblical the name is.
I love looking at the social security website at the trend in a name over time, I wouldnt want my kid to have the same name as 5 other classmates…

Names are so fun! I love some of your choices that I’d never have thought of myself. I prefer classic names or ones that are from somewhere back in my family line. It’s nice to have that connection.

It’s funny, I grew up with a name that might as well have been Jane Doe; Sarah Brown. Seriously. There were two of me at my high school (and the other Sarah Brown was NOT a good kid! Constantly sullying my good name, arg!). I’m surprised I don’t find myself gravitating toward unusual names or nontraditional spellings because of this but I prefer the less-used classical names best of all.

Growing up I always thought I would name my first girl Sara Elizabeth and call her Sara Beth. What I named my daughter was Rachel Denise. We were going for a name that matched her father’s initials. For a boy I always thought it would be Matthew David. Never got a chance to use a boy’s name.

You don’t know how happy it makes me to see the way you spelled Madeleine. There are about a million ways to spell it, but we always say my way is the right way. (Unfortunately, the people at Starbucks have never spelled my name right. The extra “e” kills them.)

I love hyphenating the last name!! I could never give up my last name, either. It’s so much of my identity, it would seem weird to toss it to the side. Besides, it goes perfectly with my first name… Thank you alliteration!

My daughter’s name is Eliot which I think is beautiful but so many people at the hospital told us it was a terrible name for a girl. People can be so rude. Then people asked well what would be call her and I always replied “her name!” I guess they thought we’d give her a more feminine nickname.

With our 1st two children we knew the names well in advance of birth. With my 3rd we didn’t decide until after she was born.

As a completely non-religious person, I oddly really like names like Noah and Moses. Also, of late Marcel, Emilio, Bruno, Harry, Benedict, Albert, Percy, Arthur … there a lot of good names out there that you rarely come across anymore. (Basil’s a cute one, but that’s not a weird pronunciation – it’s how we say the word in the UK!) On the subject of creative names; maybe it’s because I’m from over the pond but they seem pretentious and a little but cruel to me. People over here (and even more so in mainland Europe) find the names laughable. You can pick an American out of a list of 100 names because they are so out there a lot of the time! I guess it’s more mainstream in the US though and certainly not something which would be the subject of a stand up comedian. In any case, I think it can be difficult to choose a name until you meet the baby, he could suit something completely unexpected once you see him!

I love names! I work in the NICU so I keep a list going of unique names I see that I like. I am super sensitive to really popular names having grown up with 2-3 other Emily’s in every class or activity so I am always on the lookout for names that seem to be on the rise. Henry and Eleanor are my 2 favs, but they are both creeping up there in popularity. I don’t know if you care about that or not, but your boy list is pretty safe (at least where I am ). I havn’t seen any of those names much except Max, which I love but we see a lot just in case you are trying to avoid that. I know some people don’t really care though.

I also built up a list from my time working in NICU’s 🙂 My hubby and I have had a girl name picked out for 3 years, we’re so excited to be expecting our first and it’s a girl! Because we’ve had the name for so long, a few of our close friends and our family know it, but we’re not “officially” naming her until she’s born. I think working in the NICU (or even as a teacher) gives you so much exposure to names (and people’s reactions to them). It made it a lot easier for us to pick names!

I am laughing because my name is Juliet, my sister’s name is Lily, and our mom’s name is Ruth! I was hip before my time:-)

My sister and I have always loved our names. I went through a (very) brief period in elementary school where I didn’t like “Romeo & Juliet” comments, but by 4th grade I was over it and loved my name. By the way my middle name (OLD family name) is Drucilla! When we got married, our rabbi held up the marriage certificate (called a “ketubah”) and was looking it over. He got to my middle name, did a double take, turned to me and said (in his very heavy accent): “Dracula?”

My mom, Ruth, does not like her name and also never liked the Ruthie nickname. Her middle name is Gabrielle and she once said she wished that had been her first name instead. My grandma didn’t make that her first name because they were afraid people would call her Gabby and they didn’t like that.

My own kids have old-lady names—Eva and Jane. I don’t mind that they probably will not ever be back in style. They are comfy and (I think!) lovely old family names that have personal meaning to us:-)

I’m kind of letting my husband pick the name (with full veto power on my part). He seems to be really excited about naming the kid and I think it’s a great way to let him feel involved with this little person growing inside me. That and the names I tend to gravitate towards would probably lead to teasing later in life or became way too popular recently. I still love the names Falcon (as in Robert Falcon Scott – Antarctic explorer), Edison, Addison, Madison, Emery and place names like Dakota and Savannah. But I really like some of the names my hubby is throwing out there.

Slightly annoyed that some of our favorite names already went to our pets.

Are people really trying to talk you out of hyphenation? Or was that just a preemptive strike against possible comments? I think, while people are super opinionated about names, at the end of the day it is totally rude to ridicule a chosen baby name to the parents face. Having an opinion is fine…
Our son STILL does not have a first name! I love Sawyer, my husband hates it. We have a list of Names we agree on, and we might just wait until the baby comes to pick one.

And because I know you will appreciate this, I have a cousin whose middle name is Lorien,as in Lothlorien. I think it is pretty!

There is such power in a name and really, you have to choose what you love and what you can see being the best fit for that child, at that point in your life. When I was pregnant, the name Willow that’s on your list kept coming up, too, but the closer to the birth we got, it wasn’t feeling right anymore so it got scratched but I still love the name.

Of the girl names you wrote, at least least half are all in use by MANY of my daughter’s 5 year old friends…Lily, Juliet, Ella, Lily, etc. I think some of those names are the new Susan or the new Katie or Julie when I was growing up. I think I had 10 friends named Katie and my daughter has many Ella and Lily’s as friends 🙂

I go back & forth on girl names all the time. Luckily, babies are nowhere in the near future for us!

I would love to name a future daughter Georgia…I think it is an old-fashioned, classic name. However, I graduated from the University of Georgia and SEC fans are known to be a bit…fanatical…and I’d be afraid someone would think I named her after my school! I also like the name Bonnie as a nod to my favorite movie/book, Gone With The Wind….it isn’t as obvious as Scarlett 🙂 But the husband vetoed that. I’d like to have Rebecca included for my grandmother. Her name was Frances Rebecca, I just can’t bring myself to do Frances 🙂

For a boy, I’ve been hung up on John Ryan for a while. John is my dad’s middle name and Ryan is my husband’s.

Lily is my future daughter’s name (at least, at the moment) and I like Violet, too.

Have you seen the names of Jamie Oliver’s kids? I think they’re adorable, and they’re all floral (at least the girls). “Daisy Boo,” “Poppy Honey” and “Petal Blossom.” The boy’s name is “Buddy Bear.” That might be up your alley….

We are not preggo yet, but have already picked names (because I wanted to make sure we could come to some sort of agreeance :)). For a boy, he will be Bennett Holmes McLendon and go by Bennett…for a girl, Sarah Mia (pronounced My-uh) McLendon and will go by Mia (my mother-in-law’s Swedish middle name :)) or possibly a double name? Not sure if I like Sarah Mia together?

If my sweetie and I ever have kids, our first son will be named Daniel John, no doubt! Daniel after his best friend he lost, John after my father who I lost. I have NO idea about girls names! Except Fiona. I really like Fiona.

Some of my favorite girls names have kind of been ruined for me by others of the same name, ha ha. At least for now 🙂

We named our son Ashton, and I’m still in love with it just as much as the day my husband and I both said we liked it 10 years ago. But I also love the name Asher that is on your list.

For girl’s names, my husband and I have had the hardest time agreeing on one but so far we both like the name Elle…possibly calling her Ellie at times. But going along with your nature theme, I also really like the name Meadow for a girl, yet I don’t know if I’d have the guts to actually name my daughter that. Still love that name though!

Love all the names! We’re not sharing ours (at all!) until the kiddo is born. We’ve had names for 2 of each (even though we really only want 2 kiddos) picked out for a while. Although last night the hubby mentioned that we weren’t set on names yet. *ahem, what?!? Need to have a chat with him!* If it’s a boy, it’ll be his middle name (which is his mom’s maiden name) with middle name unknown at this point; if it’s a girl, it’ll be my grandmother’s middle name with my great-grandmother’s name (other side) as the middle name (my grandmother, my mother, and I all have a variation on this name as either our first or middle names, but I’m going back to the original!)

I love Max and Jasper for the boy names. We have several friends who have used mom’s maiden name as the middle name for the baby and I love that and wish it was something I would have thought of. My babies are all grown up at 14 and 10! I can’t wait to see what name you pick!

I love the name Max – was my top choice for Lucy if she’d been a boy! And funny enough re: Churton for you, I really wanted a boy middle name to be Stanyan after a street we live near in SF 🙂 Can’t wait to hear what you ultimately decide. Naming a kid is simultaneously difficult and thrilling. I’m surprised the middle name OATS isn’t on your list! 🙂

Me too! Ever since Anne of Green Gables, I’ve loved Cordelia and Adelaide! But my husband doesn’t like them because he can’t pronounce them! 🙂 I’m stuck on the name Bailey right now, for a girl. I love it!

Our friends, The Schicks, were expecting and waiting to find out the gender. It turned out to be a girl, but we were begging for them to name their baby Jack if it was a boy simply so we could ask people, “You don’t know Jack Schick?”

I know you asked us not to, but … I hope an entirely supportive comment about hyphenation is appropriate! Of course, I feel that your readers’ role IS to be entirely supportive. You’re a real person and it’s none of our business except to help you celebrate, since you’re generous enough to share!

Hah, an explanation of where “Churton” came from!!

I LOVE Bre’ad! Then as an infant you could call him your li’l crouton!

Oh, I was going to say that my husband and I didn’t change our names, either, although kids’ last names isn’t an issue for us, since we’re not having kids. I wouldn’t attack anyone for making a different choice, but for us, the tradition of the female changing her name is part of the tradition of the female being property or the male being the “head” of the family. I couldn’t abide by it!

It’s my real FIRST name that I’ve always hated. I was never able to think of anything I liked better and didn’t feel foolish changing it to, but I will always hate it. Tip: don’t name your kid something that was super trendy thirty years ago. 🙂 I think this is why I always preferred classic-type, simple names. Like “John” and “Mike”!

To Becky above (regarding Ella): that’s funny to me because I named my parents’ cat Sophie several years ago (because my mom had had so many cats & couldn’t think of a name), not realizing that was what I wanted to name my daughter later. My husband & I settled on Sophia. When my parents got another cat (their 7th), I told them to count me out naming this one!

I love hearing what a friend or family member has named their newborn. It’s just so..interesting! I love finding out if there is a special meaning behind the name (especially middle names) or if it’s just something they liked from the get-go.

My favorite names:

Girls- Giuliana, Cecilia, Catherine, Harlow
Boys-William, Henry, Finn

And I have recently fallen in love with Lennon, for a boy or a girl. Possibly a middle name choice for our future child. 🙂
Good luck with your decision!

I didn’t realize people gave flack over last name hyphenation! My husband and I are both so attached to our last names we are both hyphenated now so we do technically have the same longest last name ever so of course our son as well has that and my poor child also has a hyphenated first name, eee bad parents?

Oh dear God. We will be lucky if this baby has a name by the time it’s born.
If it’s a girl, our frontrunners are Alice, Lila, Gemma, Tessa, Lorelai, Jane (and a list of about 30 other names we have in a shared Google Doc). I LOVE Theodora but Tim says no.
If it’s a boy, the only name we agree on is Doyle, but we’re not sure if it works as a first name. I love really Irish/British/Scottish-type names–my two favorites that Tim hates are Seamus and Cedric.
Can’t wait to find out which set we’ll get to argue about tomorrow! Either way, we won’t reveal the final name until the birth most likely.

I love your list of names! Especially Hazel, that is hubby’s Grandma’s name so it was one of my top choices. Since it’s an older name for a girl we are going with Claire Hazel, but we CAN’T choose a boy’s name to save our life. Right now I’m digging Harrison, Trent, William and Jackson.

We’ll have our gender scan in early May and I cannot wait to find out what we are having since we can’t agree on a boy name I’m pulling for a girl 🙂

I got a lot of comments when I gave my son 2 middle names. Both of my grandfathers (and dad with same name as on of the grandpas) were alive when he was born. To honor all 3, he ended up being named Jacob Henry James + his last name which is a girl’s name. Go with whatever you like!!!

Random comment but did you see the baby naming episode of Friends? Ross and Rachael keep vetoing each others name suggestions and Phoebe starts liking the name veto. One of the choices was even Ruth! Ha

I was thinking of the one where they are arguing about which order to put the hyphenated names in (when Carol had Ben). Ross was mad that they wanted to put Geller last in the hyphenated last name because he knew it would get dropped and no one would ever say all the names. Willick-Bunch-Geller does seem a bit cruel!

Younger-Monson is somewhat of a mouthful particularly tacked on the end of some of your names so I’ll likely shorten it to Y-M and pronounce it “yum”. When introducing my grandson I’ll say: “This is my grandson Baker Wheatsworth Yum.” Fits right in with the bakery and Kath Eats Real Food themes 😉

Our last name is extremely common, so we always gravitated towards names that were more non-traditional. If we’d had another boy, he would have been Ryder. And lately, I have been loving the names Teagan and Tanis for a girl.

I was always annoyed growing up that my name couldn’t really be shortened into a nickname like all my other friends named Jennifer could be. (yes, I had three friends named Jennifer! Obviously, we were born in the 70’s!) And then when we named our kids, the names we chose can’t really be made into nicknames, either. Go figure.

And don’t forget to try to see what mean names your choice can be made into – make sure to do the banana-fanna-fo-fanna test. 😉

I’ve always been a fan of biblical names, not for the spirituality per se, but because they have been around for thousands of years and withstood the test of time. My kids are Mitchell (deriv. of Michael), Luke, Patrick and Bridget.

I LOVE the name Marlow! It’s my blogging persona but also my maiden name.

I have to agree with other comments that have said to be careful of sharing. I had mentioned at a party that my boy baby name was Marlow and low and behold, four months later my friend named her little baby boy Marlow! I talked myself out of being mad, it doesn’t really matter as we don’t live in the same city, our babies won’t grow up together since I’m not even pregnant. But I couldn’t help but be a little peeved secretly. It had no special meaning to them and a WHOLE BUNCH to me.

Ehhh. I’m also partial Louie. But I only like it as a baby. Baby Louie just sounds so stinkin’ cute!

I love your list of names! Can’t wait to see what you and Matt will choose 🙂 I love the idea of passing names down throughout family. My middle name is Pauline, after my great-grandmother, and while it seemed old fashioned to me when I was younger, I absolutely love it now. It’s so unique and so special to me, even though I never met my great-grandmother. Her name was actually Lillian Pauline, but she went my L. Pauline (I don’t know why because I love Lillian too!). I’m no where near starting a family, but when I do, I love the name Alexis Pauline for a girl, and I like Sebastian for a boy. 🙂

Good luck choosing, and I’m glad to see that you’re feeling better in your second trimester than you were in your first!

– Our good friends had a son last year and his name is Asher, it’s a nice boys name 🙂
– Way to go on sticking with the hyphenation. I think this is a very personal decision and no one should voice their opposition to something that is none of their business.
– I thought changing my last name to Murphy when I got married would end having to spell out my Japanese last name but sure enough, people ask “Murphy? Is there an E in there?”

Picking out names is so fun. We talked for a few years about possible baby names (just for fun) before we got pregnant, and then, funnily enough, the name we chose (Lila) ended up being one that I don’t think we’d even thought about before. We named our baby Lila Scott– Scott is my dad’s name. And now that she’s here, I think it suits her perfectly! 🙂

While I don’t have kids yet, the stress of naming my dog is enough to make me want to have a name picked out far in advance. For our future daughter we are naming her Vivian Kay and for a future son his name will be Hunter. I really like non-traditional and/or vintage names as well.

My man-friend’s father was named William Thane, and most people called him Bill. However, he was a writer and he wrote under the name: Thayne, which I really like a lot.

I don’t know if I am destined for kids or not, but I think if I have a son, I might like to name him Jakob Thayne. I really love the spellings and the way it sounds together……I wouldn’t mind calling him Jakob, or Thayne or even JT. Lots of options and I just think it sounds really awesome and neat. 🙂

I have a question. I too would love to keep my last name. I am the last “Wandfluh” in my family. My dad has all sisters and I am the only child. I feel like I am letting everyone down by changing my name. But when I have children I am nervous to hyphenate. What happens when they get married? Would they hyphenate or change their last name. Any thoughts? I love all the names you picked out. I especially like Basil!

A friend of mine took his wife’s name. She comes from a family of girls, and he a family of guys (with no worries of his family name dying out), so it was a natural choice for them. He has to face some flack for it, but handles it really well. It quite suits them both.

You are brave to share your names! I personally like classic ones and respect very parent’s right to choose. As a teacher who works with young kids, I see so many kids with the same names as their parents pick popular ones again and again. If I may, a little food for thought: I would just encourage you to notice trends – it can be tough for little ones to be “So-and-so L.,” for example, in a classroom or grade of “So-and-sos.” I have never met a child who loves having the same name as many others.

The interesting thing to me about names is that they need to fit the person being named. When we were expecting our children (we have 3) we discussed several name options and kind of left it at that. We did not know gender ahead of time so we tried to have 2 or 3 names selected for each gender. Then once the baby arrived we just had to decide which of the names seemed to fit the baby the best. For our first child it was an immediate decision. Our second (our son) took until the next day. Our third took an hour or two of discussion once she arrived. Not a perfect system but it’s what worked for us. Love your creativity and totally agree with keeping your choices to yourselves. No one else really gets a vote. 🙂

We have a little boy named Rowan….we didn’t want to share the name before he was born so I just asked strangers (my hairdresser, etc) for their opinion. 🙂 I was mainly concerned that it would be seen as a boy name (I’ve seen it used for a girl as well) so I wanted feedback. I love it because it’s unique but not far out there. I hope he loves it too.

I’ve always wanted a boy more than a girl, and I’ve had a name picked out for a LONG time! Haha! I love the name Parker I don’t know why but it’s super boy-ish to me and different. I would name him John Parker after my grandfather but call him Parker.

What fun names! They all have a lot of character. My favorite boys name is Logan. That was my parent’s back-up name if one of my younger sisters was born a boy (they didn’t want to know the sex beforehand). My friend named her little boy Brolyn (pronounced Broe-lynn). I love that too!

My daughers are Ella Katherine and Emilia Genevieve. Ella is almost 10, and when she was born, her name was relatively uncommon, but now there are so many Ella’s out there. We spelled Emilia’s name with an E to match Ella (and because my husband and I are both English teachers, and that’s the way Shakespeare spelled it), but in retrospect, I wish we had spelled it “Amelia.” I get so tired of all the different ways her name gets butchered. Just my two cents…

I’m a total name nerd. I have spreadsheets going back years with my favorite names and their meanings. I can tell what phase I was in by what names I had listed. For example I had Thor, Freya, and Odin were on my list during my love for anything Scandinavian after I traveled to Norway, Sweden, and Denmark.
My husband is a little more traditional and our son was named after his great-grandfathers. We shared his name very early because that’s what I called him while he was still in the womb. Name research is so fun. I know when we have our next one a more traditional name will be given as a compromise, but maybe I’ll name our next dog Thor.
I’m sure you know of this name site, but Nameberry.com is a really fun name site.

Who cares about the hyphenating?! I have a cousin that hyphenated her last name with her husband (and is keeping it with her daughters) so their last name is Higganbotham-Patakoski– a.k.a. a total doozie but she’s strong and awesome and didn’t want to give up her last name! I also have another friend with a hyphenated last name- Steeves-Reece and her sister is Reece-Steeves because her mom wanted it totally equal, hah!

We have a Miller – he’s 6 and I love his name more every single day. It’s a family name but when I read you were having a sweet little boy I thought the name Miller would fit well with your family loves and occupations.
We also have a Wyatt (11) – I love to tell them their name was the 1st gift we ever gave them.

Enjoy this time…it’s wonderful but the best really is yet to come and his name will be perfect.

We like classic names. Our daughter is Emily Jane (jane for my mom it was her middle name) and our son is Alexander James (James is for my husband, uncle and godfather) we call him AJ. I love Ella, Violet for girls and Baker, Nash and Davidson for boys. Best of luck to you and Matt!

We didn’t find out our first baby’s gender, and absolutely didn’t share our name choices. We just didn’t want anyone else’s input, frankly. When she was born, it was a huge reveal! Even better because we named her Helen, after my dad’s mom, which everyone found very touching. I love that Helen is classic but not common. I should add that we nicknamed her Beep early in my pregnancy, so everyone had a name to call the baby in the meantime… and she still goes by Beep most of the time!

Hi Kath! I have been reading your blog for over a year and love it! I was so excited to find out that you decided to create a new blog about your pregnancy! Wondering if I can get some help from your readers . . . my mom passed away at the end of February from a very aggressive cancer. I found out weeks before she passed that I was pregnant with her first grandchild! I am 14 weeks pregnant now and I am having some trouble coming up with a girls name. My husband I would really like to use my mom’s name (Gale) in the baby’s first name but in a unique way. I am not sure what the sex of the baby is yet but I know that I if I have a girl I would like to find a way to incorporate her name. Thanks!

I had a female camp counselor one summer growing up and her name was Galen. I remember thinking she was just so cool, and I always loved that name. It’s one idea for a version of Gale. I’m sorry for your loss, and think incorporating your mother’s name for your baby is very sweet indeed.

Galen was on our list but we felt that others would think that it was too masculine, but I do like it. I would love others opinion on the name Galexy with a nickname of “Lexy”. My mom was named after the 1950’s sitcom star “Gale Storm” so I thought of using “Storm” as a middle name but then I was second guessing my myself because it sounded too unique 😉

Since I’m a meowmy, I get to choose names w/o worrying about the namee’s peers making fun of it! My kitteh is named Nigel simply because I absolutely love the name. My next kitteh will be Dresden, for my favorite fictional wizard.

My boyfriend has a hyphenated last name and I always joke that when we get married, I’ll have a double hyphenated last name. Our dog has a double hyphenated last name and multiple middle names 🙂 My last name is pretty cool, so I think we’ll have to work something out so that I can keep my name and have a part of his.

I love nature and antique names too. I’m still a few years away from having kids, but I have a few names in mind. I LOVE Eloise for a girl. For a boy I like Cullen, Everett, Wesley, Leo, and Jude.

Max would be a great name and tribute to his grandmother. I have always liked honoring the past 🙂 Additionally, the last name will be long so a short, simple first name is ideal. Fewer letters for him to write.

We’re pretty sure our top boy names are Graeme or Oliver. Though I also like Elijah, Cedar, Colby and Sawyer.

The girl name list is lonnnnng: Harper, Fiona, Phoebe, Piper, Sadie, Hazel, Lily, Olive, Elliot, Maile, Eden, Eleanor, Emory, and Kieran. Harper has always been my fave, but one of my Asheville friends’ daughter’s name is Harper! I also love Lucy, but that’s our dead dog’s name! The middle name is either going to be Rose (after me!) or Mae.

Our last name is McDermott, so I want something cute and Irish-y!

I can only think of one time I’ve ever thought negatively about someone’s kid’s name… a friend of mine named her daughter Evelyn but calls her Evie. Though it’s not EE-vie like you’d normally read it, it’s EV-ie, pronounced like Evan. It’s a pretty name, but that girl is going to go her whole life correcting people!

My sisters and I love playing the “name game”…but I can’t imagine how hard it’s going to be to choose when I actually have kids!!
Some of my current favorites are Magnolia (Maggie for short), Ella (!), Claire, Lyric, Cherish
For boys I like Winston, Lincoln, Harrison, Isaiah
And can I just say I love how many “foodie” names made your list ~ Pepper, Basil, Baker ~ so cute! 🙂

Wow, your short list of girl names is REALLY close to our short list of girl names for this pregnancy.

For girls in my first pregnancy we had: Eleanora (Ella for short), Ruth, Isolde/Iseult, Lena, Violet, Amelia, Josephine, Ivy, Isla, Delilah, and Clementine. Eleanora, Ruth, Iseult, Lena, and Clementine are all family names. We named our daughter Charlotte Anais.

For boys in my first pregnancy we had: Silas, Jacob, Loic, Jack, Nathanael, and Oliver. None of which are family names. We didn’t find out the sex of the baby until delivery, so the boy name we had picked out was Arthur Daniel (both family names).

We also have had two angel babies. We named them Zachary and Aurora. I keep their middle names private.

For girls in this pregnancy we have: Evelyn, Eleanora (Ella for short), Lena, Hazel, Margaret (Daisy for short), Iris, Clementine, Flora, Julia, Ruby, Leila, Hyacinth, and Clara. Evelyn, Lena, Eleanora, and Clementine are family names. I’ve been fighting hard for Evelyn or Iris; my husband has been fighting hard for Lena or Leila.

For boys in this pregnancy we have: Jacob, Luther, Caleb, Maxwell, George, Wyatt, Avi, and Hugh/Hugo – only Max is a family name, although Caleb is an old Marines buddy of my husband’s so he considers it nearly the same. The middle name would be Daniel, my father’s name. We also liked Tristan, but since the surname is Christensen…it seems a little too rhymey. And I like Caspian (my husband does not), but I have a hard time getting over that someday on an art project their name would be written Caspian C. Say it out loud; you’ll get it. So I’ve been fighting hard for Wyatt or George and my husband wants Jacob or Caleb.

Ooh I love the name Sawyer! We just had a little girl and went traditional all the way, but the next child, be it boy or girl, will get the first name of Jett, my maiden name. If its a boy my husband’s vote is Jett McClane. Of John McClane fame from the Die Hard movies…

I should say, I also second (third? fourth? seven billionth?) the decision to keep the name to yourself. When I was pregnant the first time, we told someone we were thinking about Silas or for a boy or Fleur for a girl and they pretended to sneeze and told us they were allergic to the names! WTF?! And we decided on Arthur Daniel for a boy and then had a friend who had decided on Leon Marcus suddenly switch to Arthur Daniel two days after we told her. She told us she pilfered the name when she called to announce his birth. Okay, we said, but that’s still our boy name. “You can’t name your son the same name I just gave mine!” she retorted. “I’m your friend and friends don’t steal names!”

Your kid can always change their name. My brother and several of my friends changed their names. In my brother’s case it was because his name Sandy is traditionally masculine in the Scotland or to baseball fans, but he hated when people saw it written they assumed he was a chick. His full first name is Alexander but our dad is an Alex, are grandfather AJ, and great-grandpa is another Alex. So now my brother goes by Sanders, still different but not mistaken to be feminine. One friend changed a “creative spelling” to the normal spelling and another changed her last name because she didn’t like it.

My family is not creative with names if you couldn’t tell. My brother is the eighth only son of an only son with the same name. Its also the same first name as sixty percent of the men with our surname, though that is very unusual. He threatens to name a kid Han Solo, but I know he will maintain the tradition. My name is used every generation in my family and goes back four generations to the woman who adopted my great-great-great grandmother.

I can’t imagine using a name that wasn’t a family name. Everyone in my family is named after someone in a previous generation, though there is often a literary overlap. Like my aunt Emily is named for a cousin of my grandmother’s and Emily Bronte.

My dad wanted to name me Fifi Trixie-Belle. Thank god, my mother said no. Its hard enough being the child of hippies and a prosecutor, since they break most of the laws I uphold, but I can’t imagine saying “Fifi Trixie-Belle for the prosecution, your honor.”

My name is Kaye – pronounced like the letter, my mother’s name is Jye – also pronounced like the letter. Were I to have a daughter, she will be named Elle…like the letter. 😉
Ideally, I’d like a boy and a girl, but were I to have two girls, the second daughter will be Emme.
My husband is not on board with this – and my concession is that we could name girl #1 Ella (an excellent name) and Emma. I told him he can name the boys. They don’t have to have alphabet names! 😀

I hyphenated my name, but I usually just use my last name. Occasionally I go by his name at work functions bc it does sorta get to him I think. I love Asher for a boy or girl! Although, I can see where the “As” at the front might lead to covenient name calling. Good luck at your appt!

Obviously I am partial to Ella, haha 🙂 I like so many of those girls names! Some were on my girls name list. But I also had a little boy 3 months ago and we made the name of our residential college (aka our dorm) where we first met his middle name – Pierson. I like the idea of honoring your history as a couple through your school! Also I like including a bit of family in there too when possible (my son is named after my dad who had no brothers or sons and thus his surname died out since all the women changed their names). Also I had my mother’s maiden name as my middle name growing up (she never changed her last name) and I think it’s cool for your kid to have a part of your name too.

I knew a Baker (boy) growing up! I also knew a Nash (girl) and didn’t realize it could also be a boy’s name until that show Nash Bridges. lol

I’ve commented before on my support for hyphenating. If my daughter ends up wishing we all had the same last name, my husband and I have agreed we’ll all hyphenate (all three have the same hyphenated last name) at that time.

I’m not pregnant (and wont be for a few years) but I already have a long list of names!

I really like the name Maple for a boy or girl… but I’m sort of stuck on Juniper and Jupiter… June and Jupe! When I was in the Peace Corps in W. Africa, we had a security guard at HQ who was named Jupiter…. he was awesome and I loved calling him Jupe. I think it could work for a girl, too.

Fiance is sort of into it (except that juniper is one of his worth allergies!!), so we’ll see. 🙂

I love Evelyn for a girl’s name. It’s my middle name and I used to be embarrassed of it because it’s so old fashioned, but now I absolutely love it; I was sad to see it go when I took my husband’s last name put my maiden name in its place.

Love it that you’re including your last name! Hyphenated names can be tricky, of course, but as you said, your boy will figure it out!

Love the names you’ve picked out, too. I have to say, as someone with a highly unusual (although not made up, it’s biblical in origin) name, I’ve come to appreciate it more as I’ve grown older. There’s weight behind it. If I were to have a kid (highly unlikely, so this is more a theoretical exercise than anything else), I think I’d go with something classic, but not overly common. For a girl, I like Maude. For a boy, I love, love the name Ira- and I have actually bestowed that name upon my cranky Persian.

Of the names you chose, I think I like Ruth the most; when I worked at a nursing home years ago, I was always particularly fond of the Ruths. Another interesting note: while the nursing home Catherines tended to be whiny, the Katherines were lovely!

Naming a child is such a huge responsibility! When we were having twin boys, it was seriously double hard to come up with 4 names that worked well together and didn’t rhyme. We chose Dylan and Brady. The older two are Larissa and Garrett. I love all the names we chose. My faves on your boy list is Dax (my son Brady sold his truck to a Dax last week!), and Nash. Other boys names that were on the top of my list way back when were Marshall, Drew, Carter and Parker. We chose Parker as a middle name for Brady. Love names!!

This is one of my most favorite things to talk about! It drives my husband crazy! (We don’t have kids yet.)

Anyhow, I am American and he is Austrian. I have LOVED the name ‘Olin’ for a boy for so long, (pronounced “OH-lin”) but he has vetoed it because he says that with his Austrian accent, it reminds him of “All In” as in the game POKER! 🙂 :)The challenge with us is that we will need to find a name that works both in English and German. Charlotte is a perfect example. Love it in English. In German, though? It is pronounced Char-LOTT-EH, which I don’t like as much.

Just throwing it out there…but my dog’s name is Bode (pronounced BO-dee) and I love this name for humans too!

Finally, true story: I’ve always thought “Lentil” would be beautiful for a girl, if people could just stop getting hung up on the BEAN. Until this day, I’ve never met anyone who agrees with me, but I still march on…:)

Love the names! Partial to Asher! We’re doing an -er name for our little one due in August also.

We are hyphenating for our baby, and honestly people get pretty up in arms about it. A lot of people worried about spelling. Give me a break. My husbands last name is Smith. Chuck a Smith at the end of any name and you’re not asking too much! But we’ve gotten a lot of unwanted feedback about it but like you we aren’t putting the issue up for debate! Congrats!

I named my son Aage Thomas (pronounced like the word “age”),
my first daughter Maeve Charlotte and my last little one
Kate Isabella. I love the names Clementine, August, Grey and Asher.
Just pick something you love!

I love the name Maeve! My son’s name is August James. We love it for him! I also like the names Roman, Rory, Liam, and Henry for boys. My daughter’s name is Madeleine Leigh and I also like Sage, Lucy, Poppy, and Harper

Here’s my two cents: I would pick and name that is not too popular or too strange.
My first daughter is Megan and because it was a popular name in the early 90’s, she has always been one of several Megan’s in her class. When she was young, she actually signed her notes to us “Love Megan L.” So, we tried to find a name for our second daughter that was not so popular, but also not too strange or different. We settled on Kendall. There are not as many of them around, and she’s never had one in her class at school.
As a former first grade teacher, I always felt bad for the children who had names that were spelled creatively so I while my girls very well could have been Meaghanne and Kyndle, we stuck with Megan and Kendall (spelled pretty much phonetically). 🙂

Also, I teach music at Nike childcare and see kids ages 3 months to 5 years each week. Here are the boy names that seem to be pretty popular (at least in Portland) these days:

Cool names! Did you read the part in Freakonomics about how important initials can be? Well, if the initials spell something negative, there ends up being a self-fulfilling prophecy for many kids unfortunately. Very interesting and something to maybe consider…

I love you have put out there your favorite names, but when you meet this baby you may decide none of those names will work and have to come up with a new name but I am sure whatever you choose you will be fine

Names are tough. For us girl names were easier than boy. We ended up with two boys and had such a tough time agreeing. We ended up with Kaeden Alan and Rowan Eugene. For Rowan’s middle name we had a couple of options, but decided to wait until he was born. He looked like a little old man, so we decided on Eugene. For a girl we liked Sydney.

My daughter is currently 7 and when she was in kindergarten and learning to read she came home so mad at me telling me we spelled her name wrong. Karlie sounds like car and car starts with a C not a K. Poor baby 😉

I’m glad to hear that people like the name Ruth! My name is Anna Ruth (Ruth is after my great-grandmother), and when I was younger I thought it was embarrassing because it was an old-lady name! Now I really love the sound of my first and middle names together, and combined with my new married name (maiden name was Holdaway – bleh, get rid of THAT klunky mess – and new name is Edney), I think Anna Ruth Edney has such a southern ring to it! I love how it flows.

You have some awesome, unique but not-too-strange names on your list. I’m sure whatever you choose will fit him perfectly!

You have some really neat ideas! Willow sounds so pretty for a girl! I also really like the names Nora, Sienna, and Hazel for a girl.

I find boys names to be more difficult. Davidson is cool, it’s somewhat traditional with a modern twist by adding the “son” at the end. Some of my favorite boys names are Chase, Frederick “Freddie”, and Owen.

Here’s my problem with (almost) any name- I’ve been teaching for years, and associate names with former students. That has definitely killed a few of the names I love!
But- I have to say- I haven’t had many students with the names on your list! I like a lot of your choices! I think my faves from the lists are Ruthie, Pepper and Frazier (awesome!) and DAX (love that!).

My hubby and I have talked about future little Martin names, and he hates my choices. My #1 for a girl is Molly (I loooove that name!) and I also like Simone (but don’t like the way it sounds with Martin….). For boys, we both like Charlie- and I’m a fan of Tommy (my maternal grandfather’s name). Neither are unique but both have special meanings to us.
I would LOVE to have girl named after my grandmother because we were very close, but her name was Mary Lou… I’m just not crazy about it.

Well, I just spent an hour reading all these comments and I never read comments 🙂
I’ve already started telling people the name I like for a girl (I’m not pregnant) because I don’t care if they tell me it sucks. Then, I realized someone might steal it, so now I’m keeping it quiet.

I’m screwed with the hyphened last name thing though. Ben’s last name is long and it doesn’t flow.

I’m a suckerr for French & Hawaiian/Polynesian names! I LOVE LOVE the name Colette for a girl. (like from the movie, Ratatouille! hehe) Christian for a boy, Skylar, for a boy/girl, Julian for a boy, Lucas for a boy, For girles: Geneveive, Juliette…
Hawaiian names; Kai (which means ocean &is unisex), Aolani (which means cloud from heaven & is unisex.. but I’d probably use that for a girl) Kailani (which means sea and sky, and is for a girl)

anyways please excuse my disorganized comment (: but I hope you found my names insightful! I LOVED how cute your names were! Literally all of them made my heart MELT!

I wouldn’t be much of a help because I’m french and the names I love might not sound good in English. But we are very traditionnal when it comes to names! Here a few we like:

Girls: Laurence, Andreanne and Gabrielle – which are all popular here in Quebec!
Boys: Alexis (which in English could be a girl’s name) and Raphael

I find that naming a boy is much harder than a girl. While there was a big trend to have both parent’s last names a few years ago, the trend faded away and most of the people I know who have both names end up using just one most of the time. My little cousin is a perfect exemple, her name is Genevieve Labbe St-Amour, which she found too long to write, so she now just goes by Genevieve St-Amour, her father’s last name.

But it comes down to the parents personnal choice, and at the end of the day, that’s what counts! Your kids will figure it out, like you said!

I think that this is likely a redundant comment, because it sounds like you put a lot of thought into names (and into everything!), but just a little from our experience naming our son…we went around and around looking for the right name (we had a girl name all ready to go…Ruby Annah…and were totally thrown for a loop at our ultrasound!). As we considered boy names we thought about all the awful nicknames other kids could give the child based on first name, first and middle name, initials, etc. We also thought about how the name would be not only for a baby but a teen and a professional adult. In addition we thought about the difficulty others would have pronouncing or spelling the name. When all was said and done we rejected our first choice (Beck) because even though to us it was an homage to one of our favorite authors, we knew many people would think we named our kid after a band. We went instead with Zachary, which is classic and suits our kid brilliantly. I have zero regrets about chosing a more mainstream name than we had initially planned.

Also, we had expected to call him Zac (or Zack, or Zach), and we did for 20 weeks, but as soon as he was born it was clear he was a full on Zachary. My folks had a similar experience with my sister. They had named her Katherine but when she was born they said she was clearly not a Katherine so she is Samantha. So you might want a backup in your back pocket…just in case!

I have an 11 week old and her name is Madeline Rose. Rosa was my grandmother’s name (who has passed away) and we just like Madeline. I like my own name – Christie – because it was easy to understand and common-ish but not super common. There was maybe one other one at school. I think Madeline is about the same. My husband’s name is Jason and there were SO MANY of them in school.

My criteria was just this: name her what you want to call her. I didn’t want to do the “we’re naming him ___ but calling him ____”. However, we still get asked all the time “are you going to call her Maddie”. Heh.

Although I am NO WHERE near the point of my life of having kids (let’s be serious, I don’t even have a steady boyfriend right now)…It seems like I always think about what I would name my kids if I had them. When my mom had me, she named me after her favorite TV character on whatever show she was obsessed with when she was pregnant (Krystle Carrington, Dynasty if you couldn’t tell) and I always thought that was the COOLEST thing. So I made the promise to her that I would do the same thing with my first born. But here’s some names I just like in general…

I like the idea of having a bunch of names and then letting the baby “show or tell” you his name. My sister was dead set on Jacob….but there was no way the baby wanted to be Jacob…so Ben became his name and he sure is a Ben!

Someone told me there is a culture where you live with the baby for two day and night…he/she attached to you constantly and on the 3rd day you will start calling the baby by the name he/she was meant to have or wanted!

I love that you love your last name so much that you wanted and want your baby to have it. Good for you!

I feel like boys’ names are so much harder than girls names! A lot on your girls list are either on mine or have been. Some faves right now are Hazel, Pearl, Ruby and Paloma (I’m looking into italian girl’s names, though, when the time comes).
For boys every single one my husband and I have talked about he has shot down!! My favourite – Luca – he said no to because it ends with an A. I have suggested others like Levi or Elliot and he is okay with those, but I’m not 100%. Good thing, because we have lots of time before a baby happens!
Good luck with your name search 🙂

My name is Katherine, and I named my son Matthew, despite pressure to name him the third in a line of family names. My husband felt pressure too, but as soon as he witnessed the birth thought he was a Matthew. Once a person has a baby, he or she quickly learns that your life really isn’t ultimately about you, it’s about the child, so I think a child deserves a name he will be happy with as an individual and as an adult. I will say that given the long last name, perhaps it should be short, or it will be cut off of everything. Sounds weird but now that I’ve survived the junior high years with my son, I am glad he doesn’t have a groovy name! Now that he is older he thanks me for that as well.

I have a classic but uncommon first name, which I used to hate but I now love. For that reason, I want to avoid the super popular names when it comes to my kids. Unfortunately, some of my favorites are super-popular right now so they will probably be nixed (sigh). Since we are binational/lingual, it also has to be a name that sounds good in french. And I also kept my name and think we will hyphenate 🙂

Nice Names. I’m surprised to see my daughter’s name on your girl list. In her four years of life we’ve only met one other Flora. Much to my surprise, people have trouble grasping what her name is. I had no idea it was such an uncommon name until well after she was born. Uncommon names are nice though, if I call “Flora” on the playground she knows I’m talking to her!

In all of these comments, I’m surprised I’m the first to mention the Jewish tradition! There are a lot of superstitions in Judaism, such as naming someone after a living relative (it is seen as “stealing” some of that person’s soul). Traditionally, people are named after a deceased relative, but not directly. For example, my older sister Jaimi is named after our great-grandfather Jacob, and my middle name Caryn is from our great-grandfather Charlie. I like that the names are unique, but have a family connection.
When I was growing up, I was so jealous of people with names like Matthew or Jessica who, during the first day of school, could tell the teacher, “I like to be called matt/jessie/etc” Don’t ask me why, I just hated that I could never say “I like to be called Rach, please!” But now I love my name as it is!

I’m nowhere near to being a mom, but have you considered the name Karoline? I get a lot of compliments on it. I’ve never met anyone with the same spelling, (K) and have maybe met a few “caroline’s” in my lifetime! Or just change the first letter to a common name you love 🙂

We chose a name, fell in love with it and didn’t tell anyone. What a sweet and peaceful 9 months that was!!! We named our little boy, River. I love the name River. Just because there has never been a SCJ River or a President River, does that mean there never can be?? I think not. We live near Boulder, CO, so it’s not quite as controversial here as around the small Nebraska town where my family lives.

I wanted to name a girl Caroline or Katherine (Katie) but was discouraged by my mother who thought they were both too old fashioned. I still wish I had gone with my heart, not that I don’t love my daughter’s name (Laura Kathleen) but I will always think I should have had a girl named Caroline or Katie.

Ever since I first read To Kill a Mockingbird, I have wanted to name my future son Atticus. Then I moved to Greece, fell in love, got married, then pregnant, & discovered Atticus in greek means “from Athens”. Guess where we live (sigh). Talk about playground ridicule. We ended up having a baby girl, named Anatoli (sunrise). Crisis adverted. 🙂

I love the name Max and I would like the name Asher, but he is a very evil character from a show called Spartacus that i watched so i couldn’t personally pick that, lol. <3

I tend to like masculine, biblical names.. so my names probably wont be to your taste 🙂

We are naming our son Gabriel David. Gabriel after the angel Gabriel (And because I love it and love Gabe) and David after my husband's father.

Other boy names I like:
Lucas/Luke
Thomas/Tom
Samuel/Sam
Guy

Besides really wanting the middle name to be something in our family, I didn't want to name my son after anything in my life, per se. Obviously I want to like his name, but to name him after something in the bakery or your Alma mater just seems a wee bit too self involved.. he will be his own human and a name should reflect that. PURELY my little ole opinion of course. 🙂

Funny things names are! Just keep your kid’s well-being in mind. Bullies are real and you wouldn’t want the baker’s son (or daughter) to be made fun of for having a food name! Basil? Pepper? I’m not being critical, it’s just a name for cryin’ out loud. Just something to consider!
My favorites are:
Boy: Sloan, Finn, Oliver, Wyatt, and Jack
Girl: Eleanor, Yeardley, Phoebe, Elle (probounced “L”), Margaret, and Kathryn

My mother kept her maiden name back in the 80’s and when my sister and I were born my parents hyphenated our last names. I have never minded having two last names however; now that I am married and expecting I don’t know what to do with our children. Two last names was fine but three would me a bit much. Now if I want to have the same name of our children something needs to give. Something to think about.

First off, I too had a crush on Ryder Strong. 🙂 Now here are some of my family’s names i thought were unique:
Delanda Ann (my aunt)-goes by Delanda
Olive Marie (my grandmother who goes by Marie and hates Olive)
Brady (grandpa’s name)
Now-I happen to like the name Judson/Mason/Davis/Grant and Sebastian for a boy
Girls-Regan, Reese, Addison, Baylie, Stella for girls
Now, if my mother had done what you are doing and NOT TOLD anyone, I would be named Amber Jade instead of Cynthia Lauren. Of which I changed the spelling to LaurYn when I was 14 and wanted to be unique 😉 good luck.

I have boy/girl twins so we were lucky we got to pick our favorite boy and girl names. My daughter is Edie (pronounced Ee-dee) and our boy is Eoin (pronounced Owen). We get lots of compliments on both names and I think they are both unique and beautiful…but I am biased 🙂

I really like the name Cortland (like the apple) for a boy, but nobody around me seems to agree! I’m pretty set on Lily for a girl, after one of my (late) grandmothers, Lilian, and Lee for a boy, after her husband and my father, Leon. It’s crazy how honest and critical people are when you are throwing around baby names. “Oh I know a Jacob and he is a jerk!” “If you name them that then their nickname would be at school!”. 🙂

Just wanted to say that Younger-Monson flows nicely! I know what you mean about getting unwanted criticism about that choice, though – I am getting married in October and will probably be keeping my name, and EVERYONE has been like, “What in the world will you do when you have a child?!” – so I love to hear when people hyphenate. I hope it becomes more popular!

I think its funny that we are all so different, for our own personal reasons. I hyphenated my last name. Then when I had my baby girl, I only gave her my last name. I have not liked the whole 2 last names thing. I gave her mine because I like it better and figure when she gets married she can keep it or change it. If it was a boy I might have done things differently…might.

Love the names! That said, as somebody whose real first name I’d non-traditional and a “word” vs a “name” I prefer names that sound like names. That may be why Max is my favorite. Although I also love that it’s got family history.

Also, I think that the hyphenated last name is long but actually flows nicely. I think it’s great that it’s a by of you both.

I’m 22 weeks pregnant with identical twin girls right now! We just recently decided on names for the two: Brooke and Bailey. I like that they’re both “B” names (something similar), but still distinct and different enough that they’re not too matchy-matchy so they can both form their own identities.

We had the hardest time naming our second little boy. My husband says I have too many rules. We have a 3 syllable last name so I like short middle names and longer first names…they seem to flow better. Our first child we practically named the day we found it we were having a boy. The second one didn’t get named until he was actually born. We decided on Weston James. Runner Ups – Lucas, Bennett.

My youngest son (my baby of 5 kiddos) is named Asher, his twin sister is Lillian. When we chose his name, we had never met another Asher. Now his name is everywhere. It means “happy” and a happy little guy he is! 🙂 “Happy” naming!

I have a common first name, but a very rare last name. Teachers never got it right, but I do not really remember it being a big deal. Plus it usually starts a conversation because it is so rare. Now I am the teacher and I see things from the other side. I teach in a school that is somewhat diverse. I remember the first year I had a Phuc. Before I even tried the name, he pronounced it for me. This year I have seven, yes seven Madison’s ( this is in five different classes, but still it is a lot). It is very hard to keep track of who goes by Maddie and who goes by Madison. I say go for the name you love best and they will be just fine. Ps. I like Maxwell Davidson Younger-Manson. You can call him MD for short.

Interesting names. I even had a hard time coming up with our dog’s name.

Not a commentary on the last name, but my 15 yo niece will be de-hypenating her name when she turns 18, and just using one name (her father’s). Said it gets too complicated (and actually my sister agrees).

I was going to post about the British pronunciation of Basil, but a few others beat me to it!

I like all your names! I think naming can be soo hard, I love to share our names, but my family especially has been soo opinionated about the whole process, I have felt very upset about a lot of their remarks, so we have decided not to share until the baby is born.

I do love nature names for girls and royal names for boys. We are debating giving our future boys two middle names (one to honor family) but unsure if that is too much??? What do you think?

I am super close to my mom (Brenda Jean) and I told her once that if I had a daughter I’d name her after her. She hates her own name and asked me not to. So about 15 years ago I decided that if I had a little boy I would name him Brendan. I did, and he is now two. My husband just told me the other night, “You know he’s going to hate you for naming him after a woman.” Ha! He’ll be proud if he knows what’s good for him!!

Had to jump in and share! I love looking at baby names, and definitely lean toward the nontraditional! We were going through this this time last year, and picking out a boy name is REALLY tough. We named our little boy Gage Daniel, and I absolutely love it. I think you are wise to keep the name to yourself. We got picked on about several of the names we were thinking about, and even got a couple ‘please dont name him that’ after we finally settled on the name.

I love Asher, Basil, Potter, all super cute! And I am officially in love with the name Pepper for a little girl! I even tossed it out to my hubby and he gave it a thumbs up. I also love Lyric, Emery, Wren, Elyse and Hadley. Oh and my husbands fav little girl name is Aster. Enjoy the process, and at the end of the day, just make sure you pick something that truly suits your little family 🙂

One of my couple friends are Anderson and Griffin, their twins have the Griffin last name, but everyone I know calls them the Grifferson boys/family. My phone doesn’t even try to correct it in texts anymore, haha.
I have a tougher time with boy names, than girl names. The hubs really likes Xavier, and I’m a fan of more traditional “resume” names like Charles, Alexander and Anthony. For girls names I like old-fashioned names like Genevieve, Lorelai, Katherine, and Eloise. I’m trying to hold off discussing (or arguing about, haha) names until we know the sex in a few weeks.

I have a hyphenated last name! It was actually my decision, too. Because my mother never changed her name when she was married, people used to think my parents were divorced or something. This clearly upset 8 year old me. Coupled with the fact that I wished to have a name other than my own, we decided to legally change my name. My parent’s last names became my full (hyphenated) last name, and the name I wished to have became my middle name.

So, you and Matt are clearly on the right path to avoid any crazy ideas a hypothetically head-strong child could have. 🙂

But, in all seriousness, 15 years later, I’m proud to have a hyphenated last name.

My name is Kyla and my whole life I have been called “Kayla”. I always have to correct mispronunciations! When I was younger, I would ask my mom “Why didn’t you just name me Kayla”?! Her response was always “because we named you Kyla”. So, go with the name you love because that is what is important!

My husband’s name is Baker. It’s his grandmother’s maiden name. My parents were convinced Baker was his last name for the first few months we were dating. I think it’s a beautiful name, and I hope to name a future child after him.

I’m obviously partial to brantley for a girl 🙂
Ben and I decided on her name in about 5minutes and never looked back. We both love the way it sounds and that it is unique, but not ‘weird’. Some people asked us if that was a boy’s name, but we like it for our little girl!
If we ever have a little boy, we would incorporate tyler somehow, after ben’s grandad, but that’s as far as we got on boy names….

Name your son Oatmeal! So he knows that whenever his mother feels so downhearted, there’s always oatmeal to cheer her up! Even, oatmeal has his own tribute page!! Jussst kidding 😉 have fun finding your son’s name! Try Greek name, they’re pretty cool and have incredible meaning and of course, timeless! You don’t want your children stuck with Edward name when he discovered Twilight, right? In my humble opinion 😉

I’m curious – why did you keep your maiden name? I’ve kept mine mostly because I like my name better and it’s “my name.” Also, my last name starts with an S. Hubby’s last name also starts with an S. I always intended to change my name when I got married and use my maiden name as a middle name. But if I’d done that, my initials would be A.S.S.! Ugh! So I kept my maiden name. Oddly, I’ve gotten more insistent on using my maiden name the longer I’ve been married. I wonder if that will change when I have kids. I promised my mother I wouldn’t hyphenate my name because she hates when people do that. I don’t have any problem with it, but it would still cause the same A.S.S. problem for me.

Another question: Did people give you a hard time about going by Kath instead of Katie or Kate like most other Katherine’s (sp?) our age? Katherine is one of my favorite girl names, but I think it’s too common for my taste. I’ve been thinking about the name Ketryn, which is unique but doesn’t seem that “out there.” And for a nickname: Ketsy. I met a really cool girl once named that and always have kept it in mind.

For boys, I love the name Jasper but DH hates it. Plus, his last name ends with “er” (as does mine), so Jasper S—–er would sound weird. My other favorite boy names are Eliot, Beckett, Bennett, and Jonas.

I kept it because I felt like I was losing my identity by changing it. And because I wrote my senior thesis on Lucy Stone, who refused to say obey in her vows or change her name. And because I like my name! And because Matt was in full support.

Here are some more nice names to add to the list- discussion
children I have cared for as a Nanny…Lucinda, Josephine, Tobias(Toby), Edward
My daughters name is Mischa pronounced Misha, from the time she was 3, I told her she could change it, but she always said it is unusual not awful ,she still loves it. Grandsons are Max, Sam, and Finn.

This Lucinda sometimes gets Lu Lu, she has waist length dark hair and the bigest darkest brown eyes and lashes Ever …….both names suit her.
Kath, I would like to add, Don’t Tell Anyone the name of choice, even best friends !!!!! have been known to steal names.

Mine are Holly, yes for my daughter, I had miscarried a couple times before her. When we went to visit family in Tenn. there were Holly plants all over and it just struck me, then John for my boy. I had one woman say to me , John, how original. Well guess what he doesnt go to school with any, ha!

Hello! My last name is hyphenated as well, and it’s always fun to see people get confused in class when they see four names(including my middle name) to choose from in guessing my first nameZ!
My favorite boy names are Peter and Patrick. 🙂

Love the names Asher and Forest on your list. My husband and I are trying for our first baby. He likes traditional names, I like more traditional for boys but am more partial to uniquer ones for girls for some reason. Boys: Malcolm, River, Hardwinn Girls: Myashine, Fleetwood, Julya (Joo-lie-ah not Julie-a, lol). Also LOVE Max as Maxwell is my married name.

We kept our names a secret as well. We didn’t find out the sex before having our baby, so that made it even easier. We never did settle on a boy name. Luckily we didn’t need to have the boy name discussion in the hospital because we had a girl and had already decided on Emery Louise (often called Emmy Lou.)

I LOVE all of your names. My husband and I totally adored naming our boys. We unintentionally have all J names. My husband is Jared, I am Janine, and both boys are Jadyn and Jansen…It was NOT done on purpose with my oldest son. Jadyn was something we came up with a day after he was born, because we had every intention of naming him Ethan, but when he was born, he looked nothing like an Ethan….When we had our second child we had Juniper Anne as our girls name. Which many people had a comment about how unusual it was and how they did not like it! I have found most people feel they can just be blunt with you when it comes to names as if they have some input!!!! We also chose family names for middle names, my oldest son is Epifanio which is my father’s name and my grandfather’s name…my youngest is Li, a shortened version of my maiden name….Growing up Janine I thought I wanted to be more simple with naming my children, but I love their names. I also saw a bunch of comments with the name Ayla, my niece is Ayla, I love it! I also have a future niece who will be Tallulah! Have fun naming this sweet, sweet boy!!! You look amazing!!!

Great name choices you have! I’ve had some issues with ‘feedback’ on Beatrice… such as my MIL. She keeps saying ‘is it final?’.. haha, I regret telling people a head of time, but everyone now calls her Bea, so I’m happy :o)

WOW…lots of comments on what you should name your baby…let me tell you this:
once you hold him~you will know. your heart will tell you….i had an idea with my first….it would be anna, ani, anya, annie…something along those lines…one look at her, and SERENA she was. NO CLUE where it came from. I’m guessing my heart. follow your heart. in a few days you will have a nickname for him that sticks…serena is always roo. always. <3

How fun you are thinking about all the fun names you could choose! I’ve always loved the name Ella for a girl too! I grew up with a hyphenated name and it worked out just fine! I haven’t changed my last name yet and I’ve been married almost 4 years! A lot of people hyphenate and keep their own last names. More power to you guys for doing that!! We might do that for our future kids too!

I never comment on blog posts but I found this one so interesting that I keep coming back to read comments left by others.

My full name is Kathryn too and I have spent my whole life correcting people who misspell it. I am named after both of my grandmothers (middle name Louise). My grandmother was born Katherine and when she turned 18 she changed the spelling (rebel that she was!). I have always loved my name and I am actually really grateful to my parents for choosing something so beautiful and with such significance.

I was happy to give up my maiden name when I got married because my first and middle hold such significance for me that it didn’t feel like as much of a loss. Plus, I have three older brothers who between them have six sons so there will be plenty of lineage with my family name.

That said, almost all of my friends who are married have dropped their middle name and changed it to their maiden name. I think that is a great compromise for people who don’t want to lose their name all together but also don’t want to keep it…

When my husband and I start a family I know we will love the process of picking names. I think I want something that can have a formal and less formal version (i.e. Kathryn/Kate, Robert, Robbie) For girls I love Thomasina (my godfather was Thomas, died too young…), Cadence (love the way it flows) or Adalay.

For boys I would go more traditional… Robert perhaps (we both had grandfathers with that name) or something that would pay tribute to our fathers.

This post and the comments were SO FUN to read!!! My favorite boy names are Gabriel (Gabe/Gabie), Jacob (LOST haha), William, Emmett, Thatcher, Oliver, Graham. Favorite girl names are Phillipa/Pippa (and I love Pepper – so spunky!), Penelope, Blake, Cameron, Camilla, Hart or Hartley. I also like double names for girls – like Ann Arden or Mary Tanner. Although my mother, a retired teacher, swears that double name girls are trouble! 😉 One of my friends is thinking “Ellery” for a girl – and as a “Hillary,” I like it!

my boyfriend and I are a couple years from marriage and a few years from children. But we already have our daughters names picked out! Savannah Grace and Cadence (cadence doesnt have a middle name yet) and we cannot figure out a boys name BUT, I really like the name Max! My dogs name is Max and he is seriously my favorite thing ever and I know it sounds silly to name my son after my dog but I’ve had my dog since he was a puppy and I just love him, and I’d love my son to be named after him! (Not sure how he would feel about that, but whatever!)

I am lurker but am unlurking to applaud your names. My father’s name is Sherrill. Friends, family, and business associates know exactly who is calling when he says, ‘this is Sherrill” and telemarketers are always thrown off. It is a win win and he loves his name. Names are interesting and begin our history.

I really like Dax. Cool and Biblical. Whatever your choice, it will be a good one because it will be selected with love.

Even though I’m a few years away from having children, I’ve told my fiance we’re going to hyphenate the last name when we do (I’m keeping my name when we get married this summer). Glad to hear someone else wants to do it to!!!

I’m big into family names and have always wanted to name my future son, Owen, because my Mom’s maiden name is Owens. Not sure if my future husband will agree, but we’ll see! Can’t wait to see which name you end up with!

It’s such fun hearing new baby names. Keep in mind that you will not be with your child during school hours (or work hours as an adult.) So a child named Basil will have his name pronounced in the manner that the person speaking to him is familiar with; your child may spend a large portion of his life correcting people. That would get old FAST. And naming a child after the book (Potter) or movie (Esme, Jasper) of the decade will not be quite as unique as you think. I understand that “Isabella” is one of the top 10 names used last year. Try Googling “Top Baby Names.” Last year’s list included Lily. It is a LOVELY name. But no fun being called Lily Y-M at school to identify her from Lily J. & Lily B. My daughter had 3 Brandys in her class & 2 Ambers. I’m not a name expert, just another mom. My daughter (now age 26) is Dallas Rose. (My parents lived in Texas at the time.) Her brother is Nicholas Jaymes. (named after Bartles & Jaymes wine coolers, another story!) Choose a name with meaning to you, but without funky spelling that no one can pronounce (Phydeaux for Fido). Make your decision & tell NO ONE until your child is born. Nick was going to be Zack, but my sister-in-law had her baby first & she “stole” the name away from us. (I should have said that I was giving him a Klingon name to see if she would steal it!) And if you both like a name, don’t tell family or friends this early so they can argue with your choice. It is YOUR baby. You already love it with all your heart & would never do anything to bring it shame or embarrassment. My last bit of advice, NEVER take advice from a stranger! Congratulations & have FUN!

Talking about names is so much fun!! I love these from your lists: Ruthie, Ivy, Willow, Asher, Maxwell, Jasper. Some friends of mine have given their kids very beautiful names: Evelyn and Linus. Although, when I hear “Linus” I can’t help but think of Buster from Arrested Development 🙂

My own personal favorites:
Solomon or Gideon for a boy, mostly just because they sound awesome. For a girl:
Luna – Yes, this is because of Harry Potter… nerd alert!
Thalia (ta-HA-lee-ah) – I had a very intense dream a few years ago in which I found a baby and my boyfriend whispered this name to me.
Ghanima (GAH-nee-ma) – More nerdy origins: she’s a character from Frank Herbert’s Dune series.

I’m thinking we’ll use middle names to honor people in our family. Names like Michael, Lee, Maxwell, Lyn, and Marie.

Baby names!! So exciting 🙂 We’re nowhere near having babies, but we’ve talked about names a little. We like Wesley(Wes) and Anthony (G’s grandfather) for a boy and I like Madelyn for a girl. I also like Sydney, Sarah (my grandmother), Allison (my middle name), and Samantha.

Some fun baby names used recently by my friends and family: Davis, Bennett, Aiden, Cierra, Avery, Annabelle, Paige, Linley. I’m glad all of my cousins are older so I can see what creative names they come up with!

All your names are so fun and unique – you’ll pick the right one for your family, and that’s all that matters! 🙂

I have a non-traditional name (after my German/Swiss Grandmother) and for years suffered with mispronunciations and spellings but it didn’t really bother me. The funny thing is my married name is a very simple,common name and more people misspell and say it now! My girls are Bailey (after her dad’s grandmother) and Taylor (who was Samantha until she was born!) My brother’s friends were having a baby at the same time as me and when they heard Bailey the decided to name their daughter that too. They said they got it from a baseball game! My opinion about names (also decorating and clothes) it sure would be a boring world if everyone liked the same names, clothes etc. I love seeing different styles even if they aren’t for me personally I still appreciate them.

Name your son exactly what you want and love 🙂 If there is a name you love and everyone else seems to dislike it…..Oh, well! 🙂

As much as we want to….we cant always prevent our child from growing up and not getting teased. If its not a child’s name, its something else they’re teased for, unfortunatley. I was never teased for my first name but I was teased for my last name, actually. But it does not make me shameful of my maiden name 🙂 I am proud of it. And will happily correct people my entire life, if I have to 🙂

I was also teased about my weight and height. I was one of the tallest in my class. I got called ‘Chewy’ in highschool. Name after chewbacca from starwars. Not the most flattering name. I would have like to have been called Brittany. My real name.

Teasing should not define who we are (or make us change who we are), it defines who other people are (the teasers). And ‘the teasers’ will not win making me feel bad about myself and I hope to teach this to my children 🙂

I love all the names you listed! Whenever I hear (or in this case, read) the baby names discussion, I always think about the Saturday Night Live skit from the early 90s with Nicolas Cage and Julie Sweeney as a couple trying to pick a name for their soon-to-be born son. “That’s OS-WEE-PAY!!!” http://www.imdb.com/video/hulu/vi177577497/

We were going to name our baby Max. The doctor mistakenly thought our baby girl was a boy. She is all girl and her name is Nina Grace. Willow was in my top 5 names for her but my husband vetoed that one. Love your name choices! Don’t listen to anyone’s opinion about what you name your son, but I’m sure you know that. 🙂

Great names! I especially love the name Hazel. I thought I was picking something original when I named my daughter Ava…. but quickly discovered at our first visit to the ped. that every other little girl is now named Ava, LOL!

Names are so tough. I love my kids’ names, but in hindsight, I wish I had named them differently. My oldest would be Xander, my middle would be Skye, and my youngest would be Rosie. Needless to say, these are not their names.

My youngest is a girl, but if she had been a boy, her name would have been Emerson.

We didn’t share our choices with anyone before my kids were born, and I wouldn’t change that, but we did pick similar names for our girls, and it can get very confusing and people are always calling them by the wrong name. It doesn’t roll off the tongue when I list their names since the girls both end with ‘lia’. We might have figured this out before it was too late if we had mentioned our choices to others.

Max Younger-Monson is such a great name! My own favorite boys names are Homer (everyone hated this because they thought of Homer Simpson, which never even occurred to me…what about Winslow Homer and the author of the Odyssey?!), Fisher, and Bennett.

Perhaps for next time…Ruthie! My middle name is Ruth which I’ve never liked until I started thinking of naming a baby Ruthie, then it became adorable.

I guess I should say a word about why I chose Kath’s name: Katherine Anne.

I chose Katherine because it’s classic and strong, in part for Catherine of Wuthering Heights. I wanted a C, Cliff wanted the K. Not sure how we picked the rest of the spelling, as I like the Kathryn, too.

My last name is actually Pepper and I love it so much that when I get married it will become my middle name, but I do think it would make a really cute first name 🙂

Here’s an idea for a boy name, Desmond. I got a scottish terrier puppy 3 years ago, in the midst of my obsession with LOST. I thought there wouldn’t be any other name more appropriate than Desmond, not only because he was one of my fav characters, but that he also happened to be Scottish!

ALL that to say, I really had wished I had saved that name for my little boy down the road (the thought did cross my mind at the time, but frankly I couldn’t wait!). I know how much you love LOST and thought you may appreciate this in one way or another 😉

My top pick for a boy name has always been Sullivan. Just love it! Also in the running were Easton and Cooper. Alas, I have 3 girls and their names are Sage Pond, Jacksyn Beth, and Quincy Simms. Sage is the brand of fly-rod my husband fishes with, Jacksyn is for Jackson Hole, one of our favorite places to fish and Simms is the brand of waders he uses 🙂 I think all of your name choices are great. We got a lot of flack for our name choices, but we love them and that’s all that matters.

I remember baby name picking being very difficult for my husband and I. It actually came to the point where our son was born and we still hadn’t picked a name, so it`s refreshing reading other couples just don`t have that predicament. About the last name, I find it to be so nice you guys can actually have a decision about the order and what to do, though I don`t really understand why it is that in your country the second last name gets dropped 🙁 , if this were the case here I`d do the same and hyphenate.

Although naming is a bit of a daunting task, it’s fun. I love hearing about names that hold special significance to the parents/family. My sister and I would make lists of names when we were younger. 🙂 It’s annoying how some of my favorites have now become trendy.

I like the mix of names you have above, my favorites being Asher, Davidson, Juliet, Lily, and Ella.

I have 7 kids and my childrens’ names run the gamut. Looking back I wish I didn’t use the more traditional names. My children are Briana (not pronounced like Ann) Christine, Matthew Lloyd, Riley James, Isabella Corinne, Dascha (pronounced like Sasha) Claire, and Larkin Clover. Your blog is wonderful. Congratulations and best wishes to you and your husband. As you can imagine food is a very important part of our big family. And I try very hard to bring healthier, nutritious meals to our table that my entire family can enjoy and even take part in the preparation. Meal time is very special here. Your blog has been a great! Whatever name you choose will be perfect. And I love that you’re not sharing! 😉

Ohhhh names, so fun. My last baby (thought it was another girl) was going to be Georgia but then he was a boy. I liked John (especially because all of my kids middle names are Glenn after my husband & I love John Glenn) but Glenn wanted Ethan & I let him decide. I love the name Ulysses for a boy, love it! So strong and original. I went to elementary school with a Ulysses but haven’t met another one since.

Seems like a name you would like since you’re from Virginia and seem to be very much into History.

Catching up on the reads. When I married, I hyphenated my last name “Orban-Price”, because I couldn’t bare to part with it. Eric surprised me the other day and said our future kids will carry the hyphen as well. 😀

I love those list of names!! Very naturey and hipster. 🙂 Asher, Willow and Jasper top my list I suppose. What baby name sites did you use that came up with “hipster, nature, and antique” ?

My husband and I are trying to get pregnant right now, and I’ve been reading your pre-pregnancy posts about ovulation. And that started me reading the rest of your posts! So hard not to get excited about the process before it happens.

What name websites did you look at that gave you the categories of names? (Talk about putting the cart before the horse!)

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